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The impact of inter-valley scattering in modifying the density of optically injected spin polarized electrons in AlxGa1−xAs/GaAs heterostructure is investigated. Polarization resolved photoluminescence excitation measurements are performed for studying the spectral dependence of degree of circular polarization (DCP) of photoluminescence signal emanating from an adjacent quantum well layer. The experimental DCP spectra is found to deviate from the theoretically calculated curve at high excitation energy and the deviation is seen to widen with the Al-content of AlxGa1−xAs barrier layer. In the past, researchers had attributed similar deviations to the Dyakonov–Perel (DP) spin relaxation mechanism which dominates the electrons spin dynamics at high excitation energy. However, we find that the inter-valley scattering along with the DP mechanism decide the shape of optical spin orientation spectra at higher energy. In fact, at higher Al-content, the inter-valley scattering in AlxGa1–xAs layer becomes the most dominant mechanism to govern the steady state electron spin polarization at the band edge. A numerical model is also proposed for estimating the steady state electron spin polarization at zone centre by including the inter-valley scattering, energy relaxation and DP spin relaxation mechanisms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, we have investigated the spin polarization from two-dimensional hole gases (2DHG) formed in p–i–p GaAs/AlAs resonant tunnelling diodes (RTDs) under magnetic field parallel to the tunnel current. We have observed that the polarization degree from the quantum well (QW) and the 2DHG formed at the accumulation layer is highly voltage and light sensitive and exhibits a clear sign inversion. Our results indicate that the voltage dependence of the QW polarization degree is mainly due to an efficient hole-resonant tunnelling process through spin states of the QW. On the other hand, the voltage dependence of the 2DHG polarization degree seems to be dependent on the hole density which is controlled by the applied voltage across the RTDs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigated the effects of Mn ions on the spin dynamics of electrons confined in a semiconductor quantum well nearby a Mn-based ferromagnetic layer. Circularly polarized Hanle and time-resolved photoluminescence (PL) measurements were carried out on a set of samples with different Mn delta-doping concentrations. We observe a strong influence of the Mn layer for both the electron lifetime and its spin-relaxation time for high-Mn concentrations, when the electrons significantly overlap with Mn ions. Our results also show that the circular-polarization degree obtained by simple continuous-wave PL measurements is not sufficient to determine the relaxation dynamics due to a compensation effect of the lifetime and the spin-relaxation time. (Some figures may appear in colour only in the online journal) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]