Single-photon exchange interaction in a semiconductor microcavity

We consider the effective coupling of localized spins in a semiconductor quantum dot embedded in a microcavity. The lowest cavity mode and the quantum dot exciton are coupled and close in energy, forming a polariton. The fermions forming the exciton interact with localized spins via exchange. Exact diagonalization of a Hamiltonian in which photons, spins and excitons are treated quantum mechanically shows that {\it a single polariton} induces a sizable indirect exchange interaction between otherwise independent spins. The origin, symmetry properties and the intensity of that interaction depend both on the dot-cavity coupling and detuning. In the case of a (Cd,Mn)Te quantum dot, Mn-Mn ferromagnetic coupling mediated by a single photon survives above 1 K whereas the exciton mediated coupling survives at 15 K.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Long-range spin-qubit interaction mediated by microcavity polaritons

We study the optically-induced coupling between spins mediated by polaritons in a planar micro-cavity. In the strong coupling regime, the vacuum Rabi splitting introduces anisotropies in the spin coupling. Moreover, due to their photon-like mass, polaritons provide an extremely long spin coupling range. This suggests the realization of two-qubit all-optical quantum operations within tens of picoseconds with spins localized as far as hundreds of nanometers apart.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure

Spin splitting in a polarized quasi-two-dimensional exciton gas

We have observed a large spin splitting between "spin" $+1$ and $-1$ heavy-hole excitons, having unbalanced populations, in undoped GaAs/AlAs quantum wells in the absence of any external magnetic field. Time-resolved photoluminescence spectroscopy, under excitation with circularly polarized light, reveals that, for high excitonic density and short times after the pulsed excitation, the emission from majority excitons lies above that of minority ones. The amount of the splitting, which can be as large as 50% of the binding energy, increases with excitonic density and presents a time evolution closely connected with the degree of polarization of the luminescence. Our results are interpreted on the light of a recently developed model, which shows that, while intra-excitonic exchange interaction is responsible for the spin relaxation processes, exciton-exciton interaction produces a breaking of the spin degeneracy in two-dimensional semiconductors.Comment: Revtex, four pages; four figures, postscript file Accepted for publication in Physical Review B (Rapid Commun.

Construction of two Neurospora crassa Lambda ZapII-cDNA libraries

In the presence of the anti-microtubule agent benomyl, N. crassa synthesizes and secretes a major 60 kDa protein in the culture medium. This protein is absent in untreated cells (Rossier et al. 1989. Eur. J. Cell Biol. 50:333-339). To clone the gene coding for the 60 kDa protein and to unravel its function, we have constructed a cDNA library from benomyl-treated cells ( benomyl cDNA library). A second cDNA library was constructed from untreated cells in order to clone genes coding for cytoskeletal proteins ( standard cDNA library)

Differential associations of personal and general just-world beliefs with the Five-Factor and HEXACO models of personality.

Recent literature evidences differential associations of personal and general just-world beliefs with constructs in the interpersonal domain. In line with this research, we examine the respective relationships of each just-world belief with the Five-Factor and the HEXACO models of personality in one representative sample of the working population of Switzerland and one sample of the general US population, respectively. One suppressor effect was observed in both samples: Neuroticism and emotionality was positively associated with general just-world belief, but only after controlling for personal just-world belief. In addition, agreeableness was positively and honesty-humility negatively associated with general just-world belief but unrelated to personal just-world belief. Conscientiousness was consistently unrelated to any of the just-world belief and extraversion and openness to experience revealed unstable coefficients across studies. We discuss these points in light of just-world theory and their implications for future research taking both dimensions into account

Mitotic instability in benomyl-resistant transformants of a fluffy strain of Neurospora crassa

The isolation of the beta-tubulin gene from a benomyl-resistant Neurospora crassa strain (Orbach et al. 1986 Mol. Cell. Biol. 6:2452-2461) has provided a dominant selectable marker usable in transformation experiments with N. crassa

Anisotropic magnetoresistance in nanocontacts

We present ab initio calculations of the evolution of anisotropic magnetoresistance (AMR) in Ni nanocontacts from the ballistic to the tunnel regime. We find an extraordinary enhancement of AMR, compared to bulk, in two scenarios. In systems without localized states, like chemically pure break junctions, large AMR only occurs if the orbital polarization of the current is large, regardless of the anisotropy of the density of states. In systems that display localized states close to the Fermi energy, like a single electron transistor with ferromagnetic electrodes, large AMR is related to the variation of the Fermi energy as a function of the magnetization direction.Comment: 7 pages, 4 figures; revised for publication, new figures in greyscal

Magneto-optical Kerr effect in spin split two-dimensional massive Dirac materials

Two-dimensional (2D) massive Dirac electrons possess a finite Berry curvature, with Chern number 1/2, that entails both a quantized dc Hall response and a subgap full-quarter Kerr rotation. The observation of these effects in 2D massive Dirac materials such as gapped graphene, hexagonal boron nitride or transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) is obscured by the fact that Dirac cones come in pairs with opposite sign Berry curvatures, leading to a vanishing Chern number. Here, we show that the presence of spin-orbit interactions, combined with an exchange spin splitting induced either by diluted magnetic impurities or by proximity to a ferromagnetic insulator, gives origin to a net magneto-optical Kerr effect in such systems. We focus on the case of TMD monolayers and study the dependence of Kerr rotation on frequency and exchange spin splitting. The role of the substrate is included in the theory and found to critically affect the results. Our calculations indicate that state-of-the-art magneto-optical Kerr spectroscopy can detect a single magnetic impurity in diluted magnetic TMDs.We thank Allan H MacDonald, Elaine Li, Alejandro Molina-Sanchez and Joao C G Henriques for fruitful discussions. GC acknowledges Fundacao para a Ciencia e a Tecnologia (FCT) for Grant No. SFRH/BD/138806/2018. GC and JF-R acknowledge financial support from FCT through Grant No. P2020-PTDC/FIS-NAN/4662/2014. NMRP acknowledges financial support from European Commission through project 'Graphene-Driven Revolutions in ICT and Beyond' (Ref. No. 785219), FCT in the framework of Strategic Financing (Ref. No. UID/FIS/04650/2019), and COMPETE2020, PORTUGAL2020, FEDER and FCT for Grants No. PTDC/FIS-NAN/3668/2013, No. POCI-01-0145-FEDER-028114, No. POCI-01-0145-FEDER-029265 and No. PTDC/NANOPT/29265/2017. JF-R acknowledges FCT for Grant No. UTAP-EXPL/NTec/0046/2017, as well as Generalitat Valenciana funding Prometeo2017/139 and MINECO-Spain (Grant No. MAT201678625-C2)

New mutants of Neurospora crassa highly resistant to the microtubule inhibitor benomyl

Mutants of N. crassa highly resistant to benomyl with respect to hyphal growth were obtained by mutagenizing wild type strain St. Lawrence 74A or mutant Bml 511(r) which is moderately resistant to the fungicide. One of these, strain E1-91 that has a mutation mapping at the Bml (beta-tubulin) locus, showed temporary sensitivity to the benzimidazole

Electric-Field Tuning of Spin-Dependent Exciton-Exciton Interactions in Coupled Quantum Wells

We have shown experimentally that an electric field decreases the energy separation between the two components of a dense spin-polarized exciton gas in a coupled double quantum well, from a maximum splitting of $\sim 4$ meV to zero, at a field of $\sim$35 kV/cm. This decrease, due to the field-induced deformation of the exciton wavefunction, is explained by an existing calculation of the change in the spin-dependent exciton-exciton interaction with the electron-hole separation. However, a new theory that considers the modification of screening with that separation is needed to account for the observed dependence on excitation power of the individual energies of the two exciton components.Comment: 5 pages, 4 eps figures, RevTeX, Physical Review Letters (in press