431 research outputs found
Spin orientation of two-dimensional electron gas under intraband optical pumping
The theory of spin orientation of two-dimensional (2D) electron gas has been
developed for intrasubband indirect optical transitions. The monopolar optical
orientation of electrons in the conduction band is caused by the indirect
scattering with virtual intermediate states in the valence band and allowance
for selection rules for interband transitions. The considered mechanism of
optical orientation is shown to be in an inherent relation with the special
Elliot-Yafet mechanism of electron spin relaxation induced by virtual interband
scattering.Comment: 3 pages, 2 figures, Symposium "Nanostructures: Physics and
Technology", St.Petersburg, Russia, 200
Direct current driven by ac electric field in quantum wells
It is shown that the excitation of charge carriers by ac electric field with
zero average driving leads to a direct electric current in quantum well
structures. The current emerges for both linear and circular polarization of
the ac electric field and depends on the field polarization and frequency. We
present a micoscopic model and an analytical theory of such a nonlinear
electron transport in quantum wells with structure inversion asymmetry. In such
systems, dc current is induced by ac electric field which has both the in-plane
and out-of-plane components. The ac field polarized in the interface plane
gives rise to a direct current if the quantum well is subjected to an in-plane
static magnetic field.Comment: 6 pages, 3 figure
Valley separation in graphene by polarized light
We show that the optical excitation of graphene with polarized light leads to
the pure valley current where carriers in the valleys counterflow. The current
in each valley originates from asymmetry of optical transitions and electron
scattering by impurities owing to the warping of electron energy spectrum. The
valley current has strong polarization dependence, its direction is opposite
for normally incident beams of orthogonal linear polarizations. In undoped
graphene on a substrate with high susceptibility, electron-electron scattering
leads to an additional contribution to the valley current that can dominate.Comment: 4+ pages, 2 figure
Spin-orbit Hanle effect in high-mobility quantum wells
We study the depolarization of optically oriented electrons in quantum wells
subjected to an in-plane magnetic field and show that the Hanle curve
drastically depends on the carrier mobility. In low-mobility structures, the
Hanle curve is described by a Lorentzian with the width determined by the
effective g-factor and the spin lifetime. In contrast, the magnetic field
dependence of spin polarization in high-mobility quantum wells is nonmonotonic:
The spin polarization rises with the magnetic field induction at small fields,
reaches maximum and then decreases. We show that the position of the Hanle
curve maximum can be used to directly measure the spin-orbit Rashba/Dresselhaus
magnetic field.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure
Conversion of hole states by acoustic solitons
The hole states in the valence band of a large class of semiconductors are
degenerate in the projections of angular momentum. Here we show that the
switching of a hole between the states can efficiently be realized by acoustic
solitons. The microscopic mechanism of such a state conversion is related to
the valence band splitting by local elastic strain. The conversion is studied
here for heavy holes localized at shallow and deep acceptors in silicon quantum
wells.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figure
Photoexcitation of valley-orbit currents in (111)-oriented silicon metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors
We demonstrate the injection of pure valley-orbit currents in multivalley semiconductors and present the phenomenological theory of this effect. We studied photoinduced transport in (111)-oriented silicon metaloxide-semiconductor field effect transistors at room temperature. By shining circularly polarized light on exact oriented structures with six equivalent valleys, nonzero electron fluxes within each valley are generated, which
compensate each other and do not yield a net electric current. By disturbing the balance between the valley fluxes, we demonstrate that the pure valley-orbit currents can be converted into a measurable electric current
Experimental Separation of Rashba and Dresselhaus Spin-Splittings in Semiconductor Quantum Wells
The relative strengths of Rashba and Dresselhaus terms describing the
spin-orbit coupling in semiconductor quantum well (QW) structures are extracted
from photocurrent measurements on n-type InAs QWs containing a two-dimensional
electron gas (2DEG). This novel technique makes use of the angular distribution
of the spin-galvanic effect at certain directions of spin orientation in the
plane of a QW. The ratio of the relevant Rashba and Dresselhaus coefficients
can be deduced directly from experiment and does not relay on theoretically
obtained quantities. Thus our experiments open a new way to determine the
different contributions to spin-orbit coupling
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