Electron-nuclei spin relaxation through phonon-assisted hyperfine interaction in a quantum dot

Veniamin A. Abalmassov and Florian Marquardt
Phys. Rev. B 70, 075313 – Published 26 August 2004

Abstract

We investigate the inelastic spin-flip rate for electrons in a quantum dot due to their contact hyperfine interaction with lattice nuclei. In contrast to other works, we obtain a spin-phonon coupling term from this interaction by taking directly into account the motion of nuclei in the vibrating lattice. In the calculation of the transition rate the interference of first and second orders of perturbation theory turns out to be essential. It leads to a suppression of relaxation at long phonon wavelengths, when the confining potential moves together with the nuclei embedded in the lattice. At higher frequencies (or for a fixed confining potential), the zero-temperature rate is proportional to the frequency of the emitted phonon. We address both the transition between Zeeman sublevels of a single electron ground state as well as the triplet-singlet transition, and we provide numerical estimates for realistic system parameters. The mechanism turns out to be less efficient than electron-nuclei spin relaxation involving piezoelectric electron-phonon coupling in a GaAs quantum dot.

  • Figure
  • Received 9 January 2004

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.70.075313

Authors & Affiliations

Veniamin A. Abalmassov*

  • Institute of Semiconductor Physics SB RAS and Novosibirsk State University, 630090 Novosibirsk, Russia

Florian Marquardt

  • Department of Physics, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut 06511, USA

  • *Electronic address: v.abalmassov@isp.nsc.ru
  • Electronic address: florian.marquardt@yale.edu

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Issue

Vol. 70, Iss. 7 — 15 August 2004

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