We report a comprehensive study of stochastic electron spin fluctuations -- spin noise -- in lightly doped ($n$-type) bulk GaAs, which are measured using sensitive optical magnetometry based on off-resonant Faraday rotation. Frequency spectra of electron spin noise are studied as a function of electron density, magnetic field, temperature, probe laser wavelength and intensity, and interaction volume. Electron spin lifetimes $τ_s$ are inferred from the width of the spin noise spectra, and are compared with direct measurements of $τ_s$ using conventional Hanle effect methods. Both methods reveal a strong and similar dependence of $τ_s$ on the wavelength and intensity of the probe laser, highlighting the undesired influence of sub-bandgap absorption effects on the nominally `non-perturbative' spin noise measurements. As a function of temperature, the spin noise power increases approximately linearly from 1.5 K to 30 K, as expected for degenerate electrons obeying Fermi-Dirac statistics, but with an additional zero-temperature offset. Finally, as the cross-sectional area of the probe laser shrinks and fewer electrons are probed, the measured Faraday rotation fluctuations due to electron spin noise are shown to increase, as expected.
A variational theory is presented of A$^{1-}$ and A$^{2-}$ centers, i.e. of a negative acceptor ion localizing one and two conduction electrons, respectively, in a GaAs/GaAlAs quantum well in the presence of a magnetic field parallel to the growth direction. A combined effect of the well and magnetic field confines conduction electrons to the proximity of the ion, resulting in discrete repulsive energies above the corresponding Landau levels. The theory is motivated by our experimental magneto-transport results which indicate that, in a heterostructure doped in the GaAs well with Be acceptors,…
We study the electronic properties of GaAs nanowires composed of both the zincblende and wurtzite modifications using a ten-band k.p model. In the wurtzite phase, two energetically close conduction bands are of importance for the confinement and the energy levels of the electron ground state. These bands form two intersecting potential landscapes for electrons in zincblende/wurtzite nanostructures. The energy difference between the two bands depends sensitively on strain, such that even small strains can reverse the energy ordering of the two bands. This reversal may already be induced by the …
We report on both experimental and theoretical study of conduction-electron spin polarization dynamics achieved by pulsed optical pumping at room temperature in GaAs(1-x)N(x) alloys with a small nitrogen content (x = 2.1, 2.7, 3.4%). It is found that the photoluminescence circular polarization determined by the mean spin of free electrons reaches 40-45% and this giant value persists within 2 ns. Simultaneously, the total free-electron spin decays rapidly with the characteristic time ~150 ps. The results are explained by spin-dependent capture of free conduction electrons on deep paramagnetic c…
Small numbers of nitrogen dopants dramatically modify the electronic properties of GaAs, generating very large shifts in the conduction-band energies with nonlinear concentration dependence, and impurity-associated spatially-localized resonant states within the conduction band. Cross-sectional scanning tunneling microscopy provides the local electronic structure of single nitrogen dopants at the (110) GaAs surface, yielding highly anisotropic spatial shapes when the empty states are imaged. Measurements of the resonant states relative to the GaAs surface states and their spatial extent allow a…
We employ first-principles techniques tailored to properly describe semiconductors (modified Becke-Johnson potential added to the exchange-correlation functional), to obtain the electronic band structures of both the zinc-blende and wurtzite phases of GaAs, GaSb, InAs, and InSb. We extract the spin-orbit fields for the relevant valence and conduction bands at zone center, by fitting the spin-splittings resulting from the lack of space inversion symmetry of these bulk crystal structures, to known functional forms---third-order polynomials. We also determine the orientations of the spin-orbit ve…
We report on optical orientation of Mn^2+ in bulk GaAs under application of weak longitudinal magnetic field (B <= 100 mT). The manganese spin polarization of 25% is directly evaluated using spin flip Raman scattering spectroscopy. The dynamical polarization of Mn^2+ occurs due to s-d exchange interaction with optically oriented conduction band electrons. Time-resolved photoluminescence uncovers nontrivial electron spin dynamics where the oriented Mn^2+ ions tend to stabilize the electron spin.
The temperature dependence of both components of the resistivity tensor $\varrho_{xx}(T)$ and $\varrho_{xy}(T)$ has been studied at T $\geq$ 4.2 K within IQHE plateaux around filling factors ν=2 and ν=4 of medium- -mobility GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructures. In the middle of the mobility gap standard activated conductivity has been found with activation energies $Δ$ scaling well with $\hbarω_{c} / 2$ . At filling factors slightly below $ν$=2 another contribution adds to the activated conductivity at T $\leq$ 12 K. This additional contribution can be further enhanced at higher mesuring d.c. currents…
We study the optical orientation of electron spins in GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells for excitation in the growth direction and for in-plane excitation. Time- and polarization-resolved photoluminescence excitation measurements show, for resonant excitation of the heavy-hole conduction band transition, a negligible degree of electron spin polarization for in-plane excitation and nearly 100% for excitation in the growth direction. For resonant excitation of the light-hole conduction band transition, the excited electron spin polarization has the same (opposite) direction for in-plane excitation (in t…
We have fabricated AlGaAs/GaAs heterostructure devices in which the conduction channel can be populated with either electrons or holes simply by changing the polarity of a gate bias. The heterostructures are entirely undoped, and carriers are instead induced electrostatically. We use these devices to perform a direct comparison of the scattering mechanisms of two-dimensional (2D) electrons ($μ_\textrm{peak}=4\times10^6\textrm{cm}^2/\textrm{Vs}$) and holes ($μ_\textrm{peak}=0.8\times10^6\textrm{cm}^2/\textrm{Vs}$) in the same conduction channel with nominally identical disorder potentials. We f…
We demonstrate electrical electron spin injection via interband tunneling in ferromagnetic/nonmagnetic semiconductor Esaki diodes. An interband tunnel junction between ferromagnetic p+-(Ga,Mn)As and nonmagnetic n+-GaAs under reverse-bias allows spin-polarized tunneling of electrons from the valence band of (Ga,Mn)As to the conduction band of n+-GaAs. The spin polarization of tunneled electrons is probed by circular polarization of electroluminescence (EL) from an n-GaAs/InGaAs/p-GaAs light emitting structure integrated with the diode. Clear hysteresis loop with +-6.5% remanence is observed in …
Conduction electron spin lifetimes ($T_1$) and spin coherence times ($T_2$) are strongly modified in semiconductor quantum wells by electric fields. Quantitative calculations in GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells at room temperature show roughly a factor of four enhancement in the spin lifetimes at optimal values of the electric fields. The much smaller enhancement compared to previous calculations is due to overestimates of the zero-field spin lifetime and the importance of nonlinear effects.
By means of time-resolved optical orientation under strong optical pumping, the k-dependence of the electron spin-flip time (t_sf) in undoped GaAs is experimentally determined. t_sf monotonically decreases by more than one order of magnitude when the electron kinetic energy varies from 2 to 30 meV. At the high excitation densities and low temperatures of the reported experiments the main spin-flip mechanism of the conduction band electrons is the Bir-Aronov-Pikus. By means of Monte-Carlo simulations we evidence that phase-space filling effects result in the blocking of the spin flip, yielding …
The detection of light helicity is key to several research and industrial applications from drugs production to optical communications. However, the direct measurement of the light helicity is inherently impossible with conventional photodetectors based on III-V or IV-VI semiconductors, being naturally non-chiral. The prior polarization analysis of the light by a series of often moving optical elements is necessary before light is sent to the detector. A method is here presented to effectively give to the conventional dilute nitride GaAs-based semiconductor epilayer a chiral photoconductivity …
The effect of hyperfine interaction on the room-temperature defect-enabled spin filtering effect in GaNAs alloys is investigated both experimentally and theoretically through a master equation approach based on the hyperfine and Zeeman interaction between electron and nuclear spin of the spin filtering defect. We show that the nuclear spin polarization can be tuned through the optically induced spin polarization of conduction band electrons.
Molecular beam epitaxy is employed to manufacture self-assembled InAs/GaAs quantum dot Schottky resonant tunneling diodes. By virtue of a thin AlAs insertion barrier, the thermal current is effectively reduced and electron resonant tunneling through quantum dots under both forward and reverse biased conditions is observed at relatively high temperature of 77K. The ground states of quantum dots are found to be at ~0.19eV below the conduction band of GaAs matrix. The theoretical computations are in conformity with experimental data.
In this paper we show how to link the electronic structures of two III-V systems, one a direct gap material, GaAs, and the other an indirect gap material, GaP, from their bulks right down to the shape of thin nanowires. GaAs and GaP bulk and nanowire systems are studied in the zincblende and wurtzite structures both free of strain and subjected to biaxial strains perpendicular to the [111]/[0001] direction. We provide an interpretation of the band structure of nanowires, grown along the [111] (zinc-blende structure) and the [0001] (wurtzite structure) directions, in terms of the bulk band stru…
We study a current shot noise in a macroscopic insulator based on a two-dimensional electron system in GaAs in a variable range hopping (VRH) regime. At low temperature and in a sufficiently depleted sample a shot noise close to a full Poissonian value is measured. This suggests an observation of a finite-size effect in shot noise in the VRH conduction and demonstrates a possibility of accurate quasiparticle charge measurements in the insulating regime.
The conductivity of extremely high mobility dilute two-dimensional holes in GaAs changes linearly with temperature in the insulating side of the metal-insulator transition. Hopping conduction, characterized by an exponentially decreasing conductivity with decreasing temperature, is not observed when the conductivity is smaller than $e^{2}/h$. We suggest that strong interactions in a regime close to the Wigner crystallization must be playing a role in the unusual transport.
In order to characterize magnetic-field (B) tunable THz plasmonic detectors, spectroscopy experiments were carried out at liquid helium temperatures and high magnetic fields on devices fabricated on a high electron mobility GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructure. The samples were either gated (the gate of a meander shape) or ungated. Spectra of a photovoltage generated by THz radiation were obtained as a function of B at a fixed THz excitation from a THz laser or as a function of THz photon frequency at a fixed B with a Fourier spectrometer. In the first type of measurements, the wave vector of magnetopl…
Time resolved measurements of magnetization in n-GaAs have revealed a rich array of spin decoherence processes, and have shown that fairly long lifetimes (\sim 100 ns) can be achieved under certain circumstances. In time-resolved Faraday rotation and time-resolved Kerr rotation the evolution of the magnetization can be followed as a function of temperature, applied field, doping level and excitation level. We present a theory for the spin relaxation in n-GaAs based on a set of rate equations for two interacting thermalized subsystems of spins: localized states on donor sites and itinerant stat…
In this paper, we have studied the strain, bandedge, and energy levels of cubic InGaAs quantum dots (QDs) surrounded by GaAs. It is shown that overall strain value is larger in InGaAs-GaAs interfaces, and also in smaller QDs. Also, it is proved that conduction and valence band-edges and electron-hole levels are size dependent; larger QD sizes appeared to result in the lower recombination energies. Moreover, more number of energy levels separates from the continuum states of bulk GaAs and comes down into the QD separate levels. In addition, degeneracy of eigenvalues was found to be subjected to…
We have used a polarized microluminescence technique to investigate photocarrier charge and spin transport in n-type depleted GaAs nanowires ($ \approx 10^{17}$ cm$^{-3}$ doping level). At 6K, a long-distance tail appears in the luminescence spatial profile, indicative of charge and spin transport, only limited by the length of the NW. This tail is independent on excitation power and temperature. Using a self-consistent calculation based on the drift-diffusion and Poisson equations as well as on photocarrier statistics (Van Roosbroeck model), it is found that this tail is due to photocarrier d…
We show that an insulated electrostatic gate can be used to strongly suppress ubiquitous background charge noise in Schottky-gated GaAs/AlGaAs devices. Via a 2-D self-consistent simulation of the conduction band profile we show that this observation can be explained by reduced leakage of electrons from the Schottky gates into the semiconductor through the Schottky barrier, consistent with the effect of "bias cooling". Upon noise reduction, the noise power spectrum generally changes from Lorentzian to $1/f$ type. By comparing wafers with different Al content, we exclude that DX centers play a d…
We study decoherence of nuclear spins in a nanoscale GaAs device based on resistively detected nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). We demonstrate how the spin echo technique can be modified for our system, and this is compared to the damping of Rabi-type coherent oscillations. By selectively decoupling nuclear-nuclear and electron-nuclear spin, we determine decoherence rates due to individual mechanisms, namely, direct or indirect dipole coupling between different or like nuclides and electron-nuclear spin coupling. The data reveal that the indirect dipole coupling between Ga and As mediated by …
We present a real-time abinitio description of optical orientation in bulk GaAs due to the coupling with an ultrashort circular polarized laser source. The injection of spin polarized electrons in the conduction band is correctly reproduced, and a non vanishing spin polarization ($\mathbf{P}$) parallel to the direction of propagation of the laser ($z$) emerges. A detailed analysis of the generation and the evolution of $\mathbf{P}(t)$ is discussed. The single $\mathbf{k}$-point dynamics is a motion of precession around a fixed axis with constant $|\mathbf{P}|$ and fixed frequency. Instead, the…
Concerning with the recent experiment of time-resolved two-photon photo-emission spectral measurements on semiconductors (GaAs, InP), we theoretically study real time relaxation dynamics of macroscopically photo-excited electrons, toward the Fermi degeneracy formation in an originally vacant conduction band of these semiconductors. Very soon after the photo-excitation, the whole electrons are shown to exhibit a quite rapid relaxation, like an avalanching phenomenon, mainly due to successive multi-(optical and acoustic) phonon emission from them. Repeating this multi-phonon process, the whole e…
Inter-band photo-excitation of electron states with the twisted photons in GaAs, a direct band-gap bulk semiconductor, is considered theoretically. Assuming linearity of the quantum transition amplitudes and applying Wigner-Eckart theorem, we derive a plane-wave expansion of twisted-photon amplitudes and obtain relative probabilities for magnetic sub-level population of the photo-electrons in conduction band. The approach for calculating the position dependent electron polarization, resulting from photo-absorption of twisted light, is described for vertical transitions in the $Γ$ - point. Theo…
One-body mechanisms of spin splitting of the energy spectrum of 2D electrons in a one-side doped (001) GaAs/Al$_x$Ga$_{1-x}$As quantum well have been studied theoretically and experimentally. The interfacial spin splitting has been shown to compensate (enhance) considerably the contribution of the bulk Dresselhaus (Bychkov-Rashba) mechanism. The theoretical approach is based on the solution of the effective mass equation in a quasitriangular well supplemented by a new boundary condition at a high and atomically sharp heterobarrier. The model takes into account the spin-orbit interaction of ele…
Simultaneous study of acoustic and optic phonon scattering of electrons and holes in undoped $\mathrm{GaAs}$/$\mathrm{Al_{x} Ga_{1-x} As}$ heterostructures
本研究利用非掺杂 GaAs/AlGaAs 异质结构，通过电阻率温度依赖性测量，在 1.6-92.5K 范围内同步研究了二维电子和空穴的声学与光学声子散射，提取了耦合常数和 LO 激活能，验证了该方法的有效性。
Understanding (and controlling) hyperfine interactions in semiconductor nanostructures is important for fundamental studies of material properties as well as for quantum information processing with electron, hole, and nuclear-spin states. Through a combination of first-principles density-functional theory (DFT) and $\mathbf{k}\cdot\mathbf{p}$ theory, we have calculated hyperfine tensors for electrons and holes in GaAs and crystalline silicon. Accounting for relativistic effects near the nuclear core, we find contact hyperfine interactions for electrons in GaAs that are consistent with Knight-s…
Hydrostatic pressure is a useful tool that can tune several key parameters in solid state materials. For example, the Landé $g$-factor in GaAs two-dimensional electron systems (2DESs) is expected to change from its bulk value $g\simeq-0.44$ to zero and even to positive values under a sufficiently large hydrostatic pressure. Although this presents an intriguing platform to investigate electron-electron interaction in a system with $g=0$, studies are quite limited because the GaAs 2DES density decreases significantly with increasing hydrostatic pressure. Here we show that a simple model, based o…
In inversion-asymmetric semiconductors, spin-orbit coupling induces a k-dependent spin splitting of valence and conduction bands, which is a well-known cause for spin decoherence in bulk and heterostructures. Manipulating nonequilibrium spin coherence in device applications thus requires understanding how valence and conduction band spin splitting affects carrier spin dynamics. This paper studies the relevance of this decoherence mechanism for collective intersubband spin-density excitations (SDEs) in quantum wells. A density-functional formalism for the linear spin-density matrix response is …
It is shown that the observed Quantum Hall Effect in epitaxial layers of heavily doped n-type GaAs with thickness (50-140 nm) larger the mean free path of the conduction electrons (15-30 nm) and, therefore, with a three-dimensional single-particle spectrum is induced by the electron-electron interaction. The Hall resistance R_xy of the thinnest sample reveals a wide plateau at small activation energy E_a=0.4 K found in the temperature dependence of the transverse resistance R_xx. The different minima in the transverse conductance G_xx of the different samples show a universal temperature depen…
We employ optical pump-probe spectroscopy to investigate the voltage dependence of spontaneous electron and nuclear spin polarizations in hybrid MnAs/n-GaAs and Fe/n-GaAs Schottky diodes. Through the hyperfine interaction, nuclear spin polarization that is imprinted by the ferromagnet acts on conduction electron spins as an effective magnetic field. We demonstrate tuning of this nuclear field from <0.05 to 2.4 kG by varying a small bias voltage across the MnAs device. In addition, a connection is observed between the diode turn-on and the onset of imprinted nuclear polarization, while traditio…
Using acoustic methods the complex high-frequency conductance of high-mobility $n$-GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructures was determined in magnetic fields 12$÷$18~T. Based on the observed frequency and temperature dependences we conclude that in the investigated magnetic field range and at sufficiently low temperatures, $T \lesssim 200$~mK, the electron system forms a Wigner crystal deformed due to pinning by disorder. At some temperature, which depends on the electron filling factor, the temperature dependences of both components of the complex conductance get substantially changed. We have ascribed t…
Positive signs of the effective g-factors for free electrons in the conduction band and electrons localized on deep paramagnetic centers have been measured in nitrogen dilute alloy GaAs{0.979}N{0.021} at room temperature. The g-factor signs have been determined from an asymmetry in the depolarization of edge photoluminescence in a transverse magnetic field (Hanle effect) at the oblique incidence of the exciting radiation and oblique-angle detection of the luminescence. The tilted spin polarization of free electrons is induced under interband absorption of circularly polarized light, and the pa…
The intensity and the giant circular polarization of edge luminescence in a longitudinal magnetic field have been measured in nitrogen alloys GaAsN under circularly polarized pumping. It has been found that these dependences are shifted with respect to zero field by a value Beff. The magnitude of the internal field Beff increases with increase in pumping intensity and reaches saturation (~250 Gauss) at great densities of excitation. The saturation of the Beff field with growth of pumping indicates that this is a field of nuclei, polarized dynamically due to hyperfine interaction with optically…
The electron spin dynamics is studied by time-resolved Kerr rotation in GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells embedded in a negatively doped-intrinsic-positively doped structures grown on (111)A or (111)B-oriented substrates. In both cases the spin lifetimes are significantly increased by applying an external electric field but this field has to point along the growth direction for structures grown on (111)A and opposite to it for the ones grown on (111)B. This extended electron spin lifetime is the result of the suppression of the D'yakonov-Perel spin relaxation mechanism [Sov. Phys. Solid State 13, 3023…
Gate-defined quantum dots in gallium arsenide (GaAs) have been used extensively for pioneering spin qubit devices due to the relative simplicity of fabrication and favourable electronic properties such as a single conduction band valley, a small effective mass, and stable dopants. GaAs spin qubits are readily produced in many labs and are currently studied for various applications, including entanglement, quantum non-demolition measurements, automatic tuning, multi-dot arrays, coherent exchange coupling, and teleportation. Even while much attention is shifting to other materials, GaAs devices …
Irradiating a semiconductor with circularly polarized light creates spin-polarized charge carriers. If the material contains atoms with non-zero nuclear spin, they interact with the electron spins via the hyperfine coupling. Here, we consider GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells, where the conduction-band electron spins interact with three different types of nuclear spins. The hyperfine interaction drives a transfer of spin polarization to the nuclear spins, which therefore acquire a polarization that is comparable to that of the electron spins. In this paper, we analyze the dynamics of the optical pumpi…
We study the electron spin relaxation in both symmetric and asymmetric GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells (QWs) grown on (110) substrates in an external magnetic field B applied along the QW normal. The spin polarization is induced by circularly polarized light and detected by time-resolved Kerr rotation technique. In the asymmetric structure, where a δ-doped layer on one side of the QW produces the Rashba contribution to the conduction-band spin-orbit splitting, the lifetime of electron spins aligned along the growth axis exhibits an anomalous dependence on B in the range 0<B<0.5 T; this results from …
Exciton fine structures in cubic III-V semiconductor GaAs, InAs and GaN quantum dots are investigated systematically and the exciton spin relaxation in GaN quantum dots is calculated by first setting up the effective exciton Hamiltonian. The electron-hole exchange interaction Hamiltonian, which consists of the long- and short-range parts, is derived within the effective-mass approximation by taking into account the conduction, heavy- and light-hole bands, and especially the split-off band. The scheme applied in this work allows the description of excitons in both the strong and weak confinemen…
We perform self-consistent Schrödinger-Poisson calculations with exchange and correlation corrections to determine the electron/hole gas in a radial hetero-junction formed in a modulation doped GaAs/AlGaAs core-multi-shell nanowire (CSNW) which is n-/p-doped. Realistic composition and geometry are mapped on an symmetry compliant two-dimensional grid, and the inversion/accumulation layers are obtained assuming mid-gap Fermi energy pinning at the surface. We show that the electron and hole gases can be tuned to different localizations and symmetries inside the core as a function of the doping le…
We investigate the dynamically polarized nuclear-spin system in Fe/\emph{n}-GaAs heterostructures using the response of the electron-spin system to nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) in lateral spin-valve devices. The hyperfine interaction is known to act more strongly on donor-bound electron states than on those in the conduction band. We provide a quantitative model of the temperature dependence of the occupation of donor sites. With this model we calculate the ratios of the hyperfine and quadrupolar nuclear relaxation rates of each isotope. For all temperatures measured, quadrupolar relaxatio…
In self assembled III-V semiconductor quantum dots, valence holes have longer spin coherence times than the conduction electrons, due to their weaker coupling to nuclear spin bath fluctuations. Prolonging hole spin stability relies on a better understanding of the hole to nuclear spin hyperfine coupling which we address both in experiment and theory in the symmetric (111) GaAs/AlGaAs droplet dots. In magnetic fields applied along the growth axis, we create a strong nuclear spin polarization detected through the positively charged trion X$^+$ Zeeman and Overhauser splittings. The observation of…
Photoluminescence measurements were carried out on Be $δ$-doped GaAs/Al$_{0.33}$Ga$_{0.67}$As heterostructure at 1.6 K in magnetic fields ($B$) up to 5 T. Luminescence originating from recombination of a two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG) and photo excited holes localized on Be acceptors was analyzed. The degree of circular polarization ($γ_C$) of the luminescence from fully occupied Landau levels was determined as a function of $B$ and the 2DEG concentration, $n_s$. At $B$ constant, $γ_C$ decreased with the increase of $n_s$. Two mechanisms of the $γ_C(n_s)$ dependence are discussed: a) the …
We study the origin of the step-like shoulder on the high energy side of the low temperature photoluminescence spectrum of heavily $p$-doped GaAs. We show experimentally that it is controlled by the Fermi-Dirac distribution of the holes and by the energy distribution of the photoexcited electrons showing a sharp step-like dependence. This step is attributed to the percolation threshold in the conduction band separating localized from delocalized electron states. A comprehensive set of optical techniques based on spin orientation of electrons, namely the Hanle effect, time- and polarization-res…
We report ab initio calculations of the spin splitting of the uppermost valence band (UVB) and the lowermost conduction band (LCB) in bulk and atomically thin GaS, GaSe, GaTe, and InSe. These layered monochalcogenides appear in four major polytypes depending on the stacking order, except for the monoclinic GaTe. Bulk and few-layer $ε$- and $γ$-type, and odd-number $β$-type GaS, GaSe, and InSe crystals are noncentrosymmetric. The spin splittings of the UVB and the LCB near the $Γ$-point in the Brillouin zone are finite, but still smaller than those in a zinc-blende semiconductor such as GaAs. O…
A semiclassical Monte Carlo approach is adopted to study the multivalley spin depolarization of drifting electrons in a doped n-type GaAs bulk semiconductor, in a wide range of lattice temperature ($40<T_L<300$ K) and doping density ($10^{13}<n<10^{16}$cm$^{-3}$). The decay of the initial non-equilibrium spin polarization of the conduction electrons is investigated as a function of the amplitude of the driving static electric field, ranging between 0.1 and 6 kV/cm, by considering the spin dynamics of electrons in both the $Γ$ and the upper valleys of the semiconductor. Doping density considera…
In case of a of the heterostructure n-GaAs/AlGaAs with sheet density $n=2 \times 10^{11}$cm$^{-2}$ and mobility $μ\approx 2 \times 10^6$ cm$^2$/V$\cdot$s with integer and fractional quantum Hall effect (IQHE and FQHE, respectively) we demonstrate the wide applicability of acoustic methods for determining the general conduction parameters of a two dimensional electron gas. We also examine the mechanisms of low-temperature conductivity in the minima of oscillations of high frequency conductivity in the IQHE and FQHE regimes. In the magnetic field region where electrons are delocalized, the param…
Recent experiments have demonstrated long spin lifetimes in uniformly n-doped quantum wells. The spin dynamics of exciton, localized, and conduction spins are important for understanding these systems. We explain experimental behavior by invoking spin exchange between all spin species. By doing so we explain quantitatively and qualitatively the striking and unusual temperature dependence in (110)-GaAs quantum wells. We discuss possible future experiments to resolve the pertinent localized spin relaxation mechanisms. In addition, our analysis allows us to propose possible experimental scenarios…
We present a simultaneous investigation of coherent spin dynamics in both localized and itinerant carriers in Fe/GaAs heterostructures using ultrafast and spin-resolved pump-probe spectroscopy. We find that for excitation densities that push the transient Fermi energy of photocarriers above the mobility edge there exist two distinct precession frequencies in the ob-served spin dynamics, allowing us to simultaneously monitor both localized and itinerant states. For low magnetic fields (below 3 T) the beat frequency between these two excitations evolves linearly, indicating that the nuclear pola…
A ring structure fabricated from GaAs is used to achieve interference of the net spin polarization of conduction band electrons. Optically polarized spins are split into two packets by passing through two arms of the ring in the diffusive transport regime. Optical pumping with circularly polarized light on one arm establishes dynamic nuclear polarization which acts as a local effective magnetic field on electron spins due to the hyperfine interaction. This local field causes one spin packet to precess faster than the other, thereby controlling the spin interference when the two packets are com…
We report on extremely sensitive measurements of changes in the microwave properties of high purity non-intentionally-doped single-crystal semiconductor samples of gallium phosphide, gallium arsenide and 4H-silicon carbide when illuminated with light of different wavelengths at cryogenic temperatures. Whispering gallery modes were excited in the semiconductors whilst they were cooled on the coldfinger of a single-stage cryocooler and their frequencies and Q-factors measured under light and dark conditions. With these materials, the whispering gallery mode technique is able to resolve changes o…
We measure simultaneously the in-plane electron g-factor and spin relaxation rate in a series of undoped inversion-asymmetric (001)-oriented GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells by spin-quantum beat spectroscopy. In combination the two quantities reveal the absolute values of both the Rashba and the Dresselhaus coefficients and prove that the Rashba coefficient can be negligibly small despite huge conduction band potential gradients which break the inversion symmetry. The negligible Rashba coefficient is a consequence of the 'isomorphism' of conduction and valence band potentials in quantum systems where…
We propose a model to explore the dynamics of spin-systems coupled by exchange interaction to the conduction band electrons of a semiconductor material that forms the channel in a ferromagnet/semiconductor/ferromagnet spin-valve structure. We show that recent observation of the novel transient transport signature in a MnAs/GaAs/MnAs spin-valve structure with paramagnetic Mn impurities [D. Saha et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., 100, 196603 (2008)] can be quantitatively understood in terms of current driven dynamical polarization of Mn spins. Using our model of spin polarized transport through Schottky …
We present an all-electron calculation of the hyperfine parameters for conduction electrons in Si, showing that: (i) all parameters scale linearly with the spin density at a $^{29}$Si site; (ii) the isotropic term is over 30 times larger than the anisotropic part; (iii) conduction electron charge density at a Si nucleus is consistent with experimental estimates; (iv) Overhauser fields in natural Si quantum dots (QDs) are two orders of magnitude smaller than in GaAs QDs. This reinforces the outstanding performance of Si in keeping spin coherence and opens access to reliable quantitative informa…
The effect of nuclear spins in Fe/GaAs all-electrical spin-injection devices is investigated. At temperatures below 50 K, strong modifications of the non-local spin signal are found that are characteristic for hyperfine coupling between conduction electrons and dynamically polarized nuclear spins. The perpendicular component of the nuclear Overhauser field depolarizes electron spins near zero in-plane external magnetic field, and can suppress such dephasing when antialigned with the external field, leading to satellite peaks in a Hanle measurement. The features observed agree well with a Monte…
