Multiphoton electronic-spin generation and transmission spectroscopy in n-type GaAs

Multiphoton electronic-spin generation in semiconductors was investigated using differential transmission spectroscopy. The generation of the electronic spins in the semiconductor samples were achieved by multiphoton pumping with circularly polarized light beam and was probed by the spin-resolved transmission of the samples. The electronic spin-polarization of conduction band was estimated and was found to depend on the delay of the probe beam, temperature as well as on the multiphoton pumping energy. The temperature dependence showed a decrease of the spin-polarization with increasing temperature. The electronic spin-polarization was found to depolarize rapidly for multiphoton pumping energy larger than the energy gap of the split-off band to the conduction band. The results were compared with those obtained in one-photon pumping, which shows that an enhancement of the electronic spin-polarization was achieved in multiphoton pumping. The findings resulting from this investigation might have potential applications in opto-spintronics, where the generation of highly polarized electronic spins is required. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.