Strain control of lattice-pseudospin currents in silicene

We investigate lattice-pseudospin currents controlled by strain in a silicene-based junction, where in strained barrier, chemical potential and perpendicular electric field are applied. Strained region may be considered as smoothly small perturbation of nearest hoping energies. Using tight-binding model including spin-orbit interaction, the pseudo Dirac fermions under the influence of pseudo-gauge potential are obtained as carriers of the system. As a result, we show that current can be selected to flow by pure A-(or B-) sublattice currents, lattice-pseudospin up (or down) currents, by varying magnitude of strain in the barrier. Pure lattice-pseudospin current gives rise to a peak at some magnitude of strain, yielding strain filtering effect. Magnitude of filtered strain may be tunable by varying chemical potential. High sensitivity performance that very small strain induces current peak is predicted for large barrier thickness. Interestingly, not only does the junction yield strain filter like that in graphene but it also leads to perfect strain control of lattice-pseudospin currents. Our work reveals potential of silicene as a nano-electro-mechanical device and pseudospintronic application.