Spin-blockaded quantum dots provide a unique setting for studying nuclear-spin dynamics in a nanoscale system. Despite recent experimental progress, observing phase-sensitive phenomena in nuclear spin dynamics remains challenging. Here we point out that such a possibility opens up in the regime where hyperfine exchange directly competes with a purely electronic spin-flip mechanism such as the spin-orbital interaction. Interference between the two spin-flip processes, resulting from long-lived coherence of the nuclear-spin bath, modulates the electron-spin-flip rate, making it sensitive to the transverse component of nuclear polarization. In a system repeatedly swept through a singlet-triplet avoided crossing, nuclear precession is manifested in oscillations and sign reversal of the nuclear-spin pumping rate as a function of the waiting time between sweeps. This constitutes a purely electrical method for the detection of coherent nuclear-spin dynamics.
Self-sustaining dynamical nuclear polarization oscillations in quantum dots
对自旋阻塞的双量子点的早期实验揭示了在存在静态(dc)源极-漏极偏置的情况下令人惊讶的鲁棒的大幅度电流振荡[参见例如K.奥诺,S. Tarucha,Phys. Rev. Lett. 92,256803(2004)]。实验证据有力地表明,动态核极化起着核心作用,但其机制仍然是一个谜。在这里,我们介绍了一个最小的,虽然现实的耦合电子和核自旋动力学模型,支持强大的自持振荡。我们的机制依赖于一个核自旋模拟的隧穿磁阻现象(自旋相关的隧穿率在一个不均匀的Overhauser场的存在下)和核自旋扩散,这支配核极化的空间分布的动力学。在实验中观察到的极长的振荡周期(高达数百秒),以及垂直和横向量子点结构之间的现象学差异,自然解释了所提出的框架。
Phase Transitions in Dissipative Quantum Transport and Mesoscopic Nuclear Spin Pumping
当竞争输运通道的矩阵元素的比例变化时,量子系统的耗散动力学中会发生拓扑相变。在这里,我们建立了一类非厄米量子行走问题的这种行为之间的关系[M。S.鲁弗斯和L. S. Levitov,Phys. Rev. Lett. 102,065703(2009)]和双量子点中的核自旋泵送,其通过在存在自旋-轨道和超精细相互作用的情况下自旋阻塞的电子三重态的衰变来介导。当自旋-轨道耦合强度超过净超精细耦合强度时,跃迁发生,并导致核自旋泵的完全抑制。在转变点以下,核泵浦伴随着电流的强烈减少,这是由于在该制度中存在非衰变的“暗态”。由于其拓扑特性,预计过渡对电子自由度的失相是鲁棒的。
Semiconductor quantum dots provide a spin-coupled system of an electron and nuclei via enhanced hyperfine interaction. We showed that the nuclear spin polarization in single quantum dots can have three stable branches under a longitudinal magnetic field. The states were accompanied by hysteresis loops around the boundaries of each branch with a change in the excitation condition. To explain these findings, we incorporated the electron spin relaxation caused by the nuclear spin fluctuation into the previously-studied dynamic nuclear spin polarization mechanism. The model reproduces the new feat…
The limiting nuclear polarization in a quantum dot under optical electron-spin orientation and applicability of the box-model of the electron-nuclear dynamics
We theoretically investigate the dynamical nuclear spin polarization in a quantum point contact (QPC) at finite magnetic field. We find that when the QPC is tuned to be spin selective, at the conductance of e^2/h, a finite bias induces a dipole-like (spatially anti-symmetric) nuclear polarization: at the QPC center the polarization is zero, while, for GaAs parameters, the nuclear spins down (up) are induced on the source (drain) side. We predict that the dipole-like polarization pattern can be distinguished from a uniform polarization due to a qualitatively different response of the QPC conduc…
Nuclear spin polarization induced by hyperfine interaction and the Edelstein effect due to strong spin-orbit interaction is investigated by quantum transport in Bi(111) thin film samples. The Bi(111) films are deposited on mica by van der Waals epitaxial growth. The Bi(111) films show micrometer-sized triangular islands with 0.39 nm step height, corresponding to the Bi(111) bilayer height. At low temperatures a high current density is applied to generate a non-equilibrium carrier spin polarization by the Edelstein effect at the Bi(111) surface, which then induces dynamic nuclear polarization b…
Repeated injection of spin polarized carriers in a quantum dot leads to the polarization of nuclear spins, a process known as dynamic nuclear spin polarization (DNP). Here, we report the first observation of p-shell carrier assisted DNP in single QDs at zero external magnetic field. The nuclear field - measured by using the Overhauser shift of the singly charged exciton state of the QDs - continues to increase, even after the carrier population in the s-shell saturates. This is also accompanied by an abrupt increase in nuclear spin buildup time as p-shell emission overtakes that of the s-shell…
Optical pump-probe techniques are used to generate and measure electron spin polarization in a gallium arsenide epilayer in which the electron spin coherence time exceeds the mode-locked laser repetition period. Resonant spin amplification occurs at magnetic fields at which the electron spin polarization excited by successive laser pulses add constructively. Measurements of Kerr rotation as a function of applied magnetic field reveal nuclear spin polarization that aligns either with or against the external magnetic field depending on whether the applied magnetic field is being decreased or inc…
Optical pump-probe time- and magnetic-field-resolved Kerr rotation measurements provide a window into the mechanisms that generate dynamic nuclear polarization in bulk gallium arsenide. Previously, we have reported an unexpected dependence of the direction of the nuclear polarization on the sweep direction of the applied external magnetic field. In this paper, we present numerical calculations based on a model for this nuclear polarization due to the optical orientation and optical Stark effect produced by a train of ultrafast optical pulses. We demonstrate the correspondence of the model to o…
Dynamic Nuclear Polarization (DNP) presently stands as the preferred strategy to enhance the sensitivity of nuclear magnetic resonance measurements, but its application relies on the use of high-frequency microwave to manipulate electron spins, an increasingly demanding task as the applied magnetic field grows. Here we investigate the dynamics of a system hosting a polarizing agent formed by two distinct paramagnetic centers near a level anti-crossing. We theoretically show that nuclear spins polarize efficiently under a cyclic protocol that combines alternating thermal jumps and radio-frequen…
Nuclear spin coherence and relaxation dynamics of all constituent isotopes of an n-doped CdTe/(Cd,Mg)Te quantum well structure are studied employing optically detected nuclear magnetic resonance. Using time-resolved pump-probe Faraday ellipticity, we generate and detect the coherent spin dynamics of the resident electrons. The photogenerated electron spin polarization is transferred into the nuclear spin system, which becomes polarized and acts back on the electron spins as the Overhauser field. Under the influence of resonant radio frequency pulses, we trace the coherent spin dynamics of the …
We report on theoretical and experimental study of the spin polarization recovery and Hanle effect for the charge carriers interacting with the fluctuating nuclear spins in the semiconductor structures. We start the theoretical description from the simplest model of static and isotropic nuclear spin fluctuations. Then we describe the modification of the polarization recovery and Hanle curves due to the anisotropy of the hyperfine interaction, finite nuclear spin correlation time, and the strong pulsed spin excitation. For the latter case, we describe the resonance spin amplification effect in …