Ultrafast Kerr rotations and zero-field dephasing time of electron spins in InAs/GaAs quantum disks

Time-resolved Kerr rotation (TRKR) measurements based on pump-probe arrangement were carried out at 5 K on the monolayer fluctuation induced InAs/GaAs quantum disks grown on GaAs substrate without external magnetic field. The lineshape of TRKR signals shows an unusual dependence on the excitation wavelength, especially antisymmetric step-shaped structures appearing when the excitation wavelength was resonantly scanned over the heavy- and light-hole subbands. Moreover, these step structures possess an almost identical decay time of ∼40 ps which is believed to be the characteristic spin dephasing time of electrons in the extremely narrow InAs/GaAs quantum disks.     

Influence of electron localization on the spin dephasing anisotropy in bias GaAs/AlGaAs coupled quantum wells

JETP Letters - Electron spin dephasing anisotropy is studied in GaAs/AlGaAs coupled quantum wells by means of a timeresolved Kerr rotation technique. It is found that the spin dephasing rate is...     

Anisotropic Spin Splitting in Step Quantum Wells

By the method of finite difference, the anisotropic spin splitting of the AlxGa1-xAs/GaAs/Aly Ga1-yAs/AlxGal-xAs step quantum wells （QWs） are theoretically investigated considering the interplay of the bulk inversion asymmetry and structure inversion asymmetry induced by step quantum well structure and external electric field. We demonstrate that the anisotropy of the total spin splitting can be controlled by the shape of the QWs and the external electric field. The interface related Rashba effect plays an important effect on the anisotropic spin splitting by influencing the magnitude of the spin splitting and the direction of electron spin. The Rashba spin splitting presents in the step quantum wells due to the interface related Rashba effect even without external electric field or magnetic field.     

Electron spin relaxation in very diluted CdMnTe quantum wells

Electron spin dephasing is studied by time-resolved Kerr rotation in n-type modulation-doped CdMnTe quantum wells with very dilute Mn content. We find good agreement between measured and calculated electron spin relaxation times, considering relaxation induced by fluctuating exchange field created by the Mn spins, and taking into account inhomogeneous heating of the Mn spins by laser pulses.     

Hanle effect driven by weak localization

The influence of weak localization on the Hanle effect in a two-dimensional system with a spin-split spectrum is considered. We show that weak localization drastically changes the dependence of a stationary spin polarization S on an external magnetic field B. In particular, the nonanalytic dependence of S on B is predicted for III-V-based quantum wells grown in the [110] direction and for the [100]-grown quantum wells having equal strengths of Dresselhaus and Bychkov-Rashba spin-orbit coupling. It is shown that in a weakly localized regime the components of S are discontinuous at B = 0. At low B, the magnetic field-induced rotation of the stationary polarization is determined by quantum interference effects. This implies that the Hanle effect in such systems is totally driven by weak localization.     

Spin photocurrents and the circular photon drag effect in (110)-grown quantum well structures

The study of spin photocurrents in (110)-grown quantum well structures is reported. The investigated effects comprise the circular photogalvanic effect and so far not observed circular photon drag effect. The experimental data can be described by an analytical expression derived from a phenomenological theory. A microscopic model of the circular photon drag effect is developed demonstrating that the generated current has a spin dependent origin. The text was submitted by the authors in English.     

Generating spin currents in semiconductors with the spin Hall effect

We investigate electrically induced spin currents generated by the spin Hall effect in GaAs structures that distinguish edge effects from spin transport. Using Kerr rotation microscopy to image the spin polarization, we demonstrate that the observed spin accumulation is due to a transverse bulk electron spin current, which can drive spin polarization nearly 40 microns into a region in which there is minimal electric field. Using a model that incorporates the effects of spin drift, we determine the transverse spin drift velocity from the magnetic field dependence of the spin polarization.     

Anomalous spin dephasing in (110) GaAs quantum wells: anisotropy and intersubband effects

A strong anisotropy of electron spin decoherence is observed in GaAs/(AlGa)As quantum wells grown on a (110) oriented substrate. The spin lifetime of spins perpendicular to the growth direction is about one order of magnitude shorter compared to spins along [110]. The spin lifetimes of both spin orientations decrease monotonically above temperatures of 80 and 120 K, respectively. The decrease is very surprising for spins along the [110] direction and cannot be explained by the usual Dyakonov-Perel dephasing mechanism. A novel spin dephasing mechanism is put forward that is based on scattering of electrons between different quantum well subbands.     

Coherent spin dynamics of carriers in ferromagnetic semiconductor heterostructures with an Mn δ layer

The coherent spin dynamics of carriers in the heterostructures that contain an InGaAs/GaAs quantum well (QW) and an Mn δ layer, which are separated by a narrow GaAs spacer 2–10 nm thick, is comprehensively studied by the magnetooptical Kerr effect method at a picosecond time resolution. The exchange interaction of photoexcited electrons in QW with the ferromagnetic Mn δ layer manifests itself in magnetic-field and temperature dependences of the Larmor precession frequency of electron spins and is found to be very weak (several microelectron volts). Two nonoscillating components related to holes exist apart from an electron contribution to the Kerr signal of polarization plane rotation. At the initial stage, a fast relaxation process, which corresponds to the spin relaxation of free photoexcited holes, is detected in the structures with a wide spacer. The second component is caused by the further spin dephasing of energyrelaxed holes, which are localized at strong QW potential fluctuations in the structures under study. The decay of all contributions to the Kerr signal in time increases substantially when the spacer thickness decreases, which correlates with the enhancement of nonradiative recombination in QW.     

Circular photogalvanic effect at inter-band excitation in semiconductor quantum wells

We observed a circular photogalvanic effect (CPGE) in GaAs quantum wells at inter-band excitation. The spectral dependence of the CPGE is measured together with that of the polarization degree of the time-resolved photoluminescence. A theoretical model takes into account spin splitting of conduction and valence bands.     

Optical pumping of nuclear spin magnetization in GaAs/AlAs quantum wells of variable electron density

We report the use of time-resolved Faraday rotation to induce and probe the polarization of nuclear spins within a set of quantum wells with varying background electron density. The electron density was controlled over a broad range by making use of structures of mixed type-I/type-II GaAs/AlAs quantum wells that spatially separate photoexcited electron–hole pairs. We find that the optically detected nuclear magnetic field decreases quasi-monotonically with increasing electron density. The likely factors responsible for this behavior are increased electron spin-lattice relaxation, increased electron spin delocalization, and dilution of the electron spin polarization.     

Coherent spin dynamics of different density high mobility two-dimensional electron gas in a GaAs quantum well

We have addressed the dependence of quasi-two-dimensional electron spin dephasing time on the electron gas density in a 17-nm GaAs quantum well using the time-resolved magneto-optical Kerr effect. A superlinear increase in the electron dephasing time with decreasing electron density has been found. The degree of electron spin relaxation anisotropy has been measured and the dependence of spin-orbit splitting on electron gas density has been determined.     

Spin-polarization dependent carrier recombination dynamics and spin relaxation mechanism in asymmetrically doped (110) n-GaAs quantum wells

Carrier recombination and electron spin relaxation dynamics in asymmetric n-doped (110) GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells are investigated with time-resolved pump-probe spectroscopy. The experiment results reveal that the measured carrier recombination time depends strongly on the polarization of pump pulse. With the same pump photon flux densities, the recombination time of spin-polarized carriers is always longer than that of the spin-balanced carriers except at low pump photon flux densities, this anomaly originates from the polarization-sensitive nonlinear absorption effect. Differing from the traditional views, in the low carrier density regime, the D'yakonov–Perel' (DP) mechanism can be more important than the Bir–Aronov–Pikus (BAP) mechanism, since the DP mechanism takes effect, the spin relaxation time in (110) GaAs QWs is shortened obviously via asymmetric doping.     

Spin coherence of holes in GaAs/(Al,Ga)As quantum wells

Carrier spin coherence in a p-doped GaAs/(Al,Ga)As quantum well with a diluted hole gas is studied by picosecond pump-probe Kerr rotation. For resonant optical excitation of the positively charged exciton the spin precession shows two types of oscillations: Electron spin beats decaying with the charged exciton radiative lifetime of 50 ps, and long-lived hole spin beats with dephasing times up to 650 ps, which decrease with increasing temperature, underlining the importance of hole localization. The mechanism of hole spin coherence generation is discussed.     

Spin precession and electron spin polarization wave in [001]-grown quantum wells

We theoretically study the spatial behaviors of spin precessions modulated by an effective magnetic field in a two-dimensional electron system with spin-orbit interaction. Through analysis of interaction between the spin and the effective magnetic field, we find some laws of spin precession in the system, by which we explain some previous phenomena of spin precession, and predict a controllable electron spin polarization wave in [001]-grown quantum wells. The shape of the wave, like water wave, mostly are ellipse-like or circle-like, and the wavelength is anisotropic in the quantum wells with two unequal coupling strengths of the Rashba and Dresselhaus interactions, and is isotropic in the quantum wells with only one spin orbit interaction.     

Coherent spin precession of electrons and excitons in charge tunable InP quantum dots

Coherent spin precession of electrons and excitons is observed in charge tunable InP quantum dots under the transverse magnetic field by means of time-resolved Kerr rotation. In a quantum dot doped by one electron, spin precession of the doped electron in the quantum dot starts out of phase with spin precession of the doped electrons in a GaAs substrate just after a trion is formed and persists for more than 2 ns even after the trion recombines. Simultaneously spin precession of a trion (hole) starts. Observation of spin precession of both a doped electron and a trion (hole) confirms creating coherent superposition of an electron and a trion as the initialization process of spin of doped electrons in quantum dots. In a neutral quantum dot, the exciton spin precession starts out of phase with spin precession of the doped electrons in a GaAs substrate and the precession frequency does not converge to 0 at the zero field limit. It contains the electron–hole exchange interaction and corresponds to the splitting between bright and dark excitons under the transverse magnetic field.     

界面生长中断对GaAs (111)衬底上 AlGaAs/GaAs量子阱电子自旋寿命的影响

用固源分子束外延技术(SSMBE)在GaAs(111)衬底上,采用不同的界面中断时间生长了多组AlGaAs/GaAs多量子阱样品(MQWs),通过室温发光光谱和时间分辨克尔旋转谱(TRKR)研究了界面生长中断对发光光谱半峰全宽(FWHM)和量子阱中电子自旋弛豫时间(自旋寿命)的影响,发现了自旋寿命随着界面生长中断时间的增加呈现先减小后增加的趋势,此变化趋势与荧光光谱半峰全宽表征的材料质量随中断时间的变化一致,适当的界面生长中断时间能有效的增加GaAs (111)衬底上AlGaAs/GaAs 多量子阱中电子自旋寿命。     

(110)-GaAs量子阱中光生载流子对电子自旋弛豫的影响

我们实验研究了(110)-GaAs量子阱中光生载流子对电子自旋弛豫的影响。通过测量量子阱的荧光寿命和光学吸收计算,我们能得到不同泵浦光功率下的带间吸收所产生的空穴浓度;相对应地,通过双色磁光科尔旋转技术,我们测量了该GaAs量子阱中电子自旋的动力学过程。结合两者,我们得到了电子自旋弛豫速率与空穴浓度的关系。实验结果表明电子自旋弛豫速率与空穴浓度呈线性依赖关系,验证了BirAronov-Pikus机制主导该体系的电子自旋弛豫。     

Tunneling-induced enhancement of self-Kerr nonlinearity in asymmetric quantum wells

We propose an asymmetric AlGaAs/GaAs double quantum wells (QWs) structure for realizing the enhancement of self-Kerr nonlinearity. It is found, with resonant tunneling, that the self-Kerr nonlinearity can be clearly enhanced, while the absorption of probe field is very small and can be safely neglected. We attribute the enhancement of self-Kerr nonlinearity mainly to the constructive interference induced by resonant tunneling.