No Arabic abstract
Semiconductor Bloch equations, in their extension including the spin degree of freedom of the carriers, are capable to describe spin dynamics on a microscopic level. In the presence of free holes, electron spins can flip simultaneously with hole spins due to electron-hole exchange interaction. This mechanism named after Bir, Aronov and Pikus, is described here by using the extended semiconductor Bloch equations and considering carrier-carrier interaction beyond the Hartree-Fock truncation. As a result we derive microscopic expressions for spin-relaxation and spin-dephasing rates.
This paper has been withdrawn by the authors. This is due to the fact that it has been substantially revised. As a consequence title and aim of the contents
We present an approach to spin dynamics by extending the optical Bloch equations for the driven two-level system to derive microscopic expressions for the transverse and longitudinal spin relaxation times. This is done for the 6-level system of electron and hole subband states in a semiconductor or a semiconductor quantum structure to account for the degrees-of-freedom of the carrier spin and the polarization of the exciting light and includes the scattering between carriers and lattice vibrations on a microscopic level. For the subsystem of the spin-split electron subbands we treat the electron-phonon interaction in second order and derive a set of equations of motion for the 2x2 spin-density matrix which describes the electron spin dynamics and contains microscopic expressions for the longitudinal (T_1) and the transverse (T_2) spin relaxation times. Their meaning will be discussed in relation to experimental investigations of these quantities.
Electron spin relaxation in bulk III-V semiconductors is investigated from a fully microscopic kinetic spin Bloch equation approach where all relevant scatterings, such as, the electron--nonmagnetic-impurity, electron-phonon, electron-electron, electron-hole, and electron-hole exchange (the Bir-Aronov-Pikus mechanism) scatterings are explicitly included. The Elliot-Yafet mechanism is also fully incorporated. This approach offers a way toward thorough understanding of electron spin relaxation both near and far away from the equilibrium in the metallic regime. The dependence of the spin relaxation time on electron density, temperature, initial spin polarization, photo-excitation density, and hole density are studied thoroughly with the underlying physics analyzed. In contrast to the previous investigations in the literature, we find that: (i) In $n$-type materials, the Elliot-Yafet mechanism is {em less} important than the Dyakonov-Perel mechanism, even for the narrow band-gap semiconductors such as InSb and InAs. (ii) The density dependence of the spin relaxation time is nonmonotonic and we predict a {em peak} in the metallic regime in both $n$-type and intrinsic materials. (iii) In intrinsic materials, the Bir-Aronov-Pikus mechanism is found to be negligible compared with the Dyakonov-Perel mechanism. We also predict a peak in the temperature dependence of spin relaxation time which is due to the nonmonotonic temperature dependence of the electron-electron Coulomb scattering in intrinsic materials with small initial spin polarization. (iv) In $p$-type III-V semiconductors, ...... (the remaining is omitted here due to the limit of space)
We provide a microscopic theory for the Doppler velocimetry of spin propagation in the presence of spatial inhomogeneity, driving electric field and the spin orbit coupling in semiconductor quantum wells in a wide range of temperature regime based on the kinetic spin Bloch equation. It is analytically shown that under an applied electric field, the spin density wave gains a time-dependent phase shift $phi(t)$. Without the spin-orbit coupling, the phase shift increases linearly with time and is equivalent to a normal Doppler shift in optical measurements. Due to the joint effect of spin-orbit coupling and the applied electric field, the phase shift behaviors differently at the early and the later stages. At the early stage, the phase shifts are the same with or without the spin-orbit coupling. While at the later stage, the phase shift deviates from the normal Doppler one when the spin-orbit coupling is present. The crossover time from the early normal Doppler behavior to the anomalous one at the later stage is inversely proportional to the spin diffusion coefficient, wave vector of the spin density wave and the spin-orbit coupling strength. In the high temperature regime, the crossover time becomes large as a result of the decreased spin diffusion coefficient. The analytic results capture all the quantitative features of the experimental results, while the full numerical calculations agree quantitatively well with the experimental data obtained from the Doppler velocimetry of spin propagation [Yang {it et al.}, Nat. Phys. {bf 8}, 153 (2012)]. We further predict that the coherent spin precession, originally thought to be broken down at high temperature, is robust up to the room temperature for narrow quantum wells. We point out that one has to carry out the experiments longer to see the effect of the coherent spin precession at higher temperature due to the larger crossover time.
Spin-dependent photon echoes in combination with pump-probe Kerr rotation are used to study the microscopic electron spin transport in a CdTe/(Cd,Mg)Te quantum well in the hopping regime. We demonstrate that independent of the particular spin relaxation mechanism, hopping of resident electrons leads to a shortening of the photon echo decay time, while the transverse spin relaxation time evaluated from pump-probe transients increases due to motional narrowing of spin dynamics in the fluctuating effective magnetic field of the lattice nuclei.