Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-condensed-matter-physics-major-option-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2019/2/c/solution

In a parabolic conduction valley, . The Lorentz force on an electron gives . In the principal axes of the stated effective-mass tensor,
Call the matrix on the right . Its characteristic polynomial is
One mode has zero frequency, corresponding to constant drift along the field; the other two have eigenvalues . Thus
More generally the ellipsoidal cyclotron mass is . The tensor axes must be rotated for the differently oriented valleys.

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