Tunable Aharonov-Anandan phase in transport through mesoscopic hole rings

We present a theoretical study of spin-3/2 hole transport through mesoscopic rings that is based on the spherical Luttinger model. A quasi-one-dimensional ring is created in a symmetric two-dimensional quantum well by a singular-oscillator potential for the radial in-plane coordinate. The quantum-interference contribution to the two-terminal ring conductance exhibits an energy-dependent Aharonov-Anandan phase, even though Rashba and Dresselhaus spin splittings are absent. Instead, confinement-induced heavy-hole–light-hole mixing is found to be the origin of this phase, which has ramifications for magnetotransport measurements in gated hole rings.