Multi-valley spin relaxation in the presence of high in-plane electric fields in $n$-type GaAs quantum wells

Abstract

Multi-valley spin relaxation in $n$-type GaAs quantum wells with in-plane electric field is investigated at high temperature by means of kinetic spin Bloch equation approach. The spin relaxation time first increases and then decreases with electric field, especially when the temperature is relatively low. We show that $L$ valleys play the role of a ``drain'' of the total spin polarization due to the large spin-orbit coupling in $L$ valleys and the strong $\Gamma$-$L$ inter-valley scattering, and thus can enhance spin relaxation of the total system effectively when the in-plane electric field is high. Under electric field, spin precession resulting from the electric-field-induced magnetic field is observed. Meanwhile, due to the strong $\Gamma$-$L$ inter-valley scattering as well as the strong inhomogeneous broadening in $L$ valleys, electron spins in $L$ valleys possess almost the same damping rate and precession frequency as those in $\Gamma$ valley. This feature still holds when a finite static magnetic field is applied in Voigt configuration, despite that the $g$-factor of $L$ valleys is much larger than that of $\Gamma$ valley. Moreover, it is shown that the property of spin precession of the whole system is dominated by electrons in $\Gamma$ valley. Temperature, magnetic field, and impurity can affect spin relaxation in low electric field regime. However, they are shown to have marginal influence in high electric field regime.

arXiv comment11 pages, 8 figures, Phys. Rev. B 78, 2008, in press

References in corpus (20)

• Spintronics: Fundamentals and applications
• Semiconductor Spintronics
• Imaging spin flows in semiconductors subject to electric, magnetic, and strain fields
• High temperature spin dephasing in n-typed GaAs quantum wells
• Effect of initial spin polarization on spin dephasing and electron g factor in a high-mobility two-dimensional electron system
• Enhanced spin relaxation time due to electron-electron scattering in semiconductors
• Hot-electron effect in spin dephasing in $n$-type GaAs quantum wells
• Spin relaxation in $n$-type GaAs quantum wells from a full microscopic approach
• Kinetics of spin coherence of electrons in an undoped semiconductor quantum well
• Dependence of spin dephasing on initial spin polarization in a high-mobility two-dimensional electron system
• Hole spin dephasing in $p$-type semiconductor quantum wells
• Longitudinal spin decoherence in spin diffusion in semiconductors
• Multi-subband effect in spin dephasing in semiconductor quantum wells
• Electron Spin Relaxation under Drift in GaAs
• Spin lifetimes and strain-controlled spin precession of drifting electrons in zinc blende type semiconductors
• Effects of strain, electric, and magnetic fields on lateral electron spin transport in semiconductor epilayers
• Spin dynamics in a compound semiconductor spintronic structure with a Schottky barrier
• Control of spin coherence in $n$-type GaAs quantum wells using strain
• Spin-orbit coupling in bulk GaAs
• Decay of spin polarized hot carrier current in a quasi one-dimensional spin valve structure

Cited by in corpus (14)

• Spin dynamics in semiconductors
• Electron spin relaxation in bulk III-V semiconductors from a fully microscopic kinetic spin Bloch equation approach
• Electron spin relaxation in graphene from a microscopic approach: Role of electron-electron interaction
• Electron spin relaxation in paramagnetic Ga(Mn)As quantum wells
• Spin diffusion in Si/SiGe quantum wells: spin relaxation in the absence of D'yakonov-Perel' relaxation mechanism
• Relaxation of Electron Spin during High-Field Transport in GaAs Bulk
• Spin-dependent inter- and intra-valley electron-phonon scattering in germanium
• $L$-valley electron $g$ factor in bulk GaAs and AlAs
• Electron spin relaxation in $p$-type GaAs quantum wells
• Hot-electron effect in spin relaxation of electrically injected electrons in intrinsic Germanium
• Electron spin diffusion at the interface of multiferroic oxides
• Electron-electron scattering effect on spin relaxation in multi-valley nanostructures
• Spin-orbit coupling and $g$-factor of $X$-valley in cubic GaN
• Effect of nonequilibrium phonons on hot-electron spin relaxation in n-type GaAs quantum wells