Physical Review B - Condensed Matter and Materials Physics
Doi
Abstract
The ability to discriminate between simultaneously occurring noise sources in
the local environment of semiconductor InGaAs quantum dots, such as electric
and magnetic field fluctuations, is key to understanding their respective
dynamics and their effect on quantum dot coherence properties. We present a
discriminatory approach to all-optical sensing based on two-color resonance
fluorescence of a quantum dot charged with a single electron. Our measurements
show that local magnetic field fluctuations due to nuclear spins in the absence
of an external magnetic field are described by two correlation times, both in
the microsecond regime. The nuclear spin bath dynamics show a strong dependence
on the strength of resonant probing, with correlation times increasing by a
factor of four as the optical transition is saturated. We interpret the
behavior as motional averaging of both the Knight field of the resident
electron spin and the hyperfine-mediated nuclear spin-spin interaction due to
optically-induced electron spin flips
