Spin filtering and entanglement detection due to spin-orbit interaction in carbon nanotube cross-junctions

We demonstrate that, due to their spin-orbit interaction, carbon nanotube cross-junctions have attractive spin projective properties for transport. First, we show that the junction can be used as a versatile spin filter as a function of a backgate and a static external magnetic field. Switching between opposite spin filter directions can be achieved by small changes of the backgate potential, and a full polarization is generically obtained in an energy range close to the Dirac points. Second, we discuss how the spin filtering properties affect the noise correlators of entangled electron pairs, which allows us to obtain signatures of the type of entanglement that are different from the signatures in conventional semiconductor cross-junctions. © 2013 American Physical Society.