We present an investigation of electron-spin dynamics in p-doped bulk GaAs due to the electron-hole exchange interaction, aka the Bir-Aronov-Pikus mechanism. We discuss under which conditions a spin relaxation times for this mechanism is, in principle, accessible to experimental techniques, in particular to 2-photon photoemission, but also Faraday/Kerr effect measurements. We give numerical results for the spin relaxation time for a range of p-doping densities and temperatures. We then go beyond the relaxation time approximation and calculate numerically the spin-dependent electron dynamics by including the spin-flip electron-hole exchange scattering and spin-conserving carrier Coulomb scattering at the level of Boltzmann scattering integrals. We show that the electronic dynamics deviates from the simple spin-relaxation dynamics for electrons excited at high energies where the thermalization does not take place faster than the spin relaxation time. We also present a derivation of the influence of screening on the electron-hole exchange scattering and conclude that it can be neglected for the case of GaAs, but may become important for narrow-gap semiconductors.
Despite its potential in the fields of optoelectronics and topological insulators, experimental electronic band structure studies of Bi-doped GaAs are scarce. The reason is the complexity of growth which tends to leave bulk and in particular surface properties in an undefined state. Here we present an in depth investigation of structural and electronic properties of GaAsBi epilayers grown by molecular beam epitaxy with high (001) crystalline order and well-defined surface structures evident from low-energy electron diffraction. X-ray and ultraviolet photoemission spectrocopy as well as angle-r…
In this paper we present an ab initio real-time analysis of free polarization decay and photon echo in extended systems. As a prototype material, we study bulk GaAs driven by ultra-short laser pulses of 10 fs (energy spread of 0.4 eV), with frequency tuned in the continuum of the optical spectrum. We compute the electronic polarization P(t), and define a computational procedure to extract the echo signal in the dipole approximation. Results are obtained in both the low and high field regime, and compared with a two-levels system (TLS) model, with parameters extracted from the ab initio simulat…
We report accurate, calculated electronic, transport, and bulk properties of zinc blende gallium arsenide (GaAs). Our ab-initio, non-relativistic, self-consistent calculations employed a local density approximation (LDA) potential and the linear combination of atomic orbital (LCAO) formalism. We strictly followed the Bagayoko, Zhao, and William (BZW) method as enhanced by Ekuma and Franklin (BZW-EF). Our calculated, direct band gap of 1.429 eV, at an experimental lattice constant of 5.65325 Å, is in excellent agreement with the experimental values. The calculated, total density of states data …
Effective-Hamiltonian reconstruction through Bloch-wave interferometry in bulk GaAs driven by strong THz fields
University of California, Santa Barbara（加州大学圣塔芭芭拉分校）；Institute for Terahertz Science and Technology, University of California, Santa Barbara（加州大学圣塔芭芭拉分校太赫兹科学与技术研究所）；University of Pennsylvania（宾夕法尼亚大学）；Exponent（埃克塞庞特公司）；Princeton University（普林斯顿大学）
Nanoscale Fe3O4 epitaxial thin film has been synthesized on MgO/GaAs(100) spintronic heterostructure, and studied with X-ray magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD). We have observed a total magnetic moment of (3.32 +- 0.1) uB/f.u., retaining 83% of the bulk value. Unquenched orbital moment of (0.47 +- 0.05) uB/f.u. has been confirmed by carefully applying the sum rule. The results offer direct experimental evidence of the bulk-like total magnetic moment and a large orbital moment in the nanoscale fully epitaxial Fe3O4/MgO/GaAs(100) heterostructure, which is significant for spintronics applications…
Surface-bulk hybridization enhances the Berry curvature dipole in GaAs(110)
Institute for Theoretical Solid State Physics, IFW Dresden（德累斯顿亥姆霍兹中心IFW凝聚态物理理论研究所）；Centro Atómico Bariloche, Instituto de Nanociencia y Nanotecnología (CNEA-CONICET)（巴里洛切原子中心，纳米科学与技术研究所（阿根廷核能委员会-国家科学研究委员会））；Instituto Balseiro（巴尔塞罗研究所）；Würzburg-Dresden Cluster of Excellence ctd.qmat（维尔茨堡-德累斯顿卓越集群ctd.qmat）
Coherent super-high-frequency (SHF) vibrations provide an excellent tool for the modulation and control of excitations in semiconductors. Here, we investigate the piezoelectric generation and propagation of longitudinal bulk acoustic waves (LBAWs) with frequencies up to 20 GHz in GaAs crystals using bulk acoustic wave resonators (BAWRs) based on piezoelectric thin ZnO films. We show that the electro-acoustic conversion efficiency of the BAWRs depends sensitively on the sputtering conditions of the ZnO films. The BAWRs were then used for the study of the propagation properties of the LBAWs in G…
We investigate theoretically the effect of nearby As (arsenic) vacancies on the magnetic properties of substitutional Mn (manganese) impurities on the GaAs (110) surface, using a microscopic tight-binding model which captures the salient features of the electronic structure of both types of defects in GaAs. The calculations show that the binding energy of the Mn-acceptor is essentially unaffected by the presence of a neutral As vacancy, even at the shortest possible ${\rm V}_{\rm As}$--Mn separation. On the other hand, in contrast to a simple tip-induced-band-bending theory and in agreement wi…
The electronic structure of bulk GaAs$_{1-x}$Bi$_x$ systems for different atomic configurations and Bi concentrations is calculated using density functional theory. The results show a Bi-induced splitting between the light-hole and heavy-hole bands at the $Γ$-point. We find a good agreement between our calculated splittings and experimental data. The magnitude of the splitting strongly depends on the local arrangement of the Bi atoms but not on the uni-directional lattice constant of the supercell. The additional influence of external strain due to epitaxial growth on GaAs substrates is studie…
The energy spectrum of vacancies in n-type bulk crystals of undoped arsenides: InAs, GaAs, CdSnAs2 and CdGeAs2 has been investigated upon the data on pressure and temperature dependences of kinetic coefficients. It is concluded, that deep donor levels correspond to native vacancies of arsenic in these semiconductor materials. The vacancy level positions in the energy scale relatively to the conductivity band edge and their pressure coefficients are defined.
Nanoscale CoFeB amorphous films have been synthesized on GaAs(100) and studied with X-ray magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM). We have found that the ratios of the orbital to spin magnetic moments of both the Co and Fe in the ultrathin amorphous film have been enhanced by more than 300% compared with those of the bulk crystalline Co and Fe, and in specifically, a large orbital moment of 0.56*10^-6 B from the Co atoms has been observed and at the same time the spin moment of the Co atoms remains comparable to that of the bulk hcp Co. The results indicat…
Surface acoustic waves in two-dimensional phononic crystals consisting of a square array of shallow, two to three micron deep cylindrical void inclusions are studied computationally via the finite element method. For the [110] propagation direction on a (001) GaAs half-space, the conventional Rayleigh wave modes, the layered substrate-associated Sezawa and Lamb modes, the high frequency longitudinal surface waves and bulk waves exhibit hybridization and modal interaction. The longitudinal, vertical shear and horizontal shear bulk wave dispersions are observed to be significant thresholds for s…
Significant efficiency droop is a major concern for light-emitting diodes and laser diodes operating at high current density. Recent study has suggested that heavily Bi-alloyed GaAs can decrease the non-radiative Auger recombination and therefore alleviate the efficiency droop. Using density functional theory, we studied a newly fabricated quaternary alloy, GaAs1-x-yPyBix, which can host significant amounts of Bi, through calculations of its band gap, spin-orbit splitting, and band offsets with GaAs. We found that the band gap changes of GaAs1-x-yPyBix relative to GaAs are determined mainly by…
A full band-structure ab initio calculation of the degree of spin polarization (DSP) in stressed bulk Si and bulk GaAs is reported. For Si, we found that compressive stress causes the DSP signal peak to decrease slightly in magnitude and to shift to higher energies.
We study the effect of charged impurity screening on spin decoherence in bulk {\it n}-type GaAs, and analyse in details the effect of the use of different Born approximations applied to a linearized Thomas-Fermi screening theory. The spin relaxation times are calculated by ensemble Monte Carlo techniques, including electron-electron, electron-impurities, and electron-phonons scattering. We carefully choose a parameter region so that all the physical approximations hold, and, in particular, a Yukawa-type potential can be used to describe the screened Coulomb interaction and the Born series conv…
Mapping of spin lifetimes to electronic states in n-type GaAs near the metal-insulator transition
对于接近金属-绝缘体转变的掺杂浓度，体n-GaAs中的最长自旋寿命超过100 ns（J.M. Kikkawa，D. D. Awschalom，Phys. Rev. Lett. 80，4313（1998））。尚未确定各自的电子状态。因此，我们调查的能量依赖于自旋寿命的n-GaAs的时间分辨克尔旋转。当占据施主态和导带态时，自旋寿命随能量变化三个数量级。最长的自旋寿命（>100 ns）被分配给离域施主带态，而导带态表现出较短的自旋寿命。局域施主带态的占领被确定为短的自旋寿命（~300 ps）和一个明显的Overhauser位移由于动态核极化。
We report on the measurements of spin relaxation in GaAs quasi-one-dimensional mesowires, relying on spin noise spectroscopy, thus adding to the existing body of spin relaxation studies in bulk, two-dimensional and zero dimensional systems. In addition to temperature and magnetic field dependence, we modify the spin relaxation time via applied electric field and aspect ratio of the mesowires, suggesting that scalable spintronics devices with controllable spin relaxation are achievable. Overall, we observed higher spin-relaxation time in mesowires compared to bulk with a spin noise exhibiting D…
We investigated elastic loss in GaAs/AlGaAs multilayers to help determine the suitability of these coatings for future gravitational wave detectors. We measured large ($\approx 70$-mm diameter) substrate-transferred crystalline coating samples with an improved substrate polish and bonding method. The elastic loss, when decomposed into bulk and shear contributions, was shown to arise entirely from the bulk loss, $ϕ_{\mathrm{Bulk}} = (5.33 \pm 0.03)\times 10^{-4}$, with $ϕ_{\mathrm{Shear}} = (0.0 \pm 5.2) \times 10^{-7}$. These results predict the coating loss of an 8-mm diameter coating in a 35…
We study spin relaxation in n-type bulk GaAs, due to the Dyakonov--Perel mechanism, using ensemble Monte Carlo methods. Our results confirm that spin relaxation time increases with the electronic density in the regime of moderate electronic concentrations and high temperature. We show that the electron-electron scattering in the non-degenerate regime significantly slows down spin relaxation. This result supports predictions by Glazov and Ivchenko. Most importantly, our findings highlight the importance of many-body interactions for spin dynamics: we show that only by properly taking into accou…
