For the realisation of scalable solid-state quantum-bit systems, spins in semiconductor quantum dots are promising candidates. A key requirement for quantum logic operations is a sufficiently long coherence time of the spin system. Recently, hole spins in III-V-based quantum dots were discussed as alternatives to electron spins, since the hole spin, in contrast to the electron spin, is not affected by contact hyperfine interaction with the nuclear spins. Here, we report a breakthrough in the spin coherence times of hole ensembles, confined in so called natural quantum dots, in narrow GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells at temperatures below 500 mK. Consistently, time-resolved Faraday rotation and resonant spin amplification techniques deliver holespin coherence times, which approach in the low magnetic field limit values above 70 ns. The optical initialisation of the hole spin polarisation, as well as the interconnected electron and hole spin dynamics in our samples are well reproduced using a rate equation model.

We have studied spin dephasing in a high-mobility two-dimensional electron system confined in a GaAs/AlGaAs quantum well grown in the [110] direction, using the resonant spin amplification (RSA) technique. From the characteristic shape of the RSA spectra, we are able to extract the spin dephasing times (SDTs) for electron spins aligned along the growth direction or within the sample plane, as well as the g factor. We observe a strong anisotropy in the spin dephasing times. While the in-plane SDT remains almost constant as the temperature is varied between 4 and 50 K, the out-of-plane SDT shows a dramatic increase at a temperature of about 25 K and reaches values of about 100 ns. The SDTs at 4 K can be further increased by additional, weak above-barrier illumination. The origin of this unexpected behavior is discussed. The SDT enhancement is attributed to the redistribution of charge carriers between the electron gas and remote donors.

We investigate spin dynamics of resident holes in a p-modulation-doped GaAs/Al0.3Ga0.7As single quantum well. Time-resolved Faraday and Kerr rotation, as well as resonant spin amplification, are utilized in our study. We observe that nonresonant or high power optical pumping leads to a resident hole spin polarization with opposite sign with respect to the optically oriented carriers, while low power resonant optical pumping only leads to a resident hole spin polarization if a sufficient inplane magnetic field is applied. The competition between two different processes of spin orientation strongly modifies the shape of resonant spin amplification traces. Calculations of the spin dynamics in the electron-hole system are in good agreement with the experimental Kerr rotation and resonant spin amplification traces and allow us to determine the hole spin polarization within the sample after optical orientation, as well as to extract quantitative information about spin dephasing processes at various stages of the evolution.

We report on the study of the linear and circular magnetogyrotropic photogalvanic effect (MPGE) in GaAs/AlGaAs quantum well structures. Using the fact that in such structures the Landé factor g * depends on the quantum well (QW) width and has different signs for narrow and wide QWs, we succeeded to separate spin and orbital contributions to both MPGEs. Our experiments show that, for most QW widths, the MPGEs are mainly driven by spin-related mechanisms, which results in a photocurrent proportional to the g * factor. In structures with a vanishingly small g * factor, however, linear and circular MPGE are also detected, proving the existence of orbital mechanisms.

We investigate the spin dynamics of high-mobility two-dimensional electrons in GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells grown along the ͓001͔ and ͓110͔ directions by time-resolved Faraday rotation at low temperatures. In measurements on the ͑001͒-grown structures without external magnetic fields, we observe coherent oscillations of the electron-spin polarization about the effective spin-orbit field. In nonquantizing magnetic fields applied normal to the sample plane, the cyclotron motion of the electrons rotates the effective spin-orbit field. This rotation leads to fast oscillations in the spin polarization about a nonzero value and a strong increase in the spin dephasing time in our experiments. These two effects are absent in the ͑110͒-grown structure due to the different symmetry of its effective spin-orbit field. The measurements are in excellent agreement with our theoretical model.