In the last few years there has been a growing interest in the possible applications of quantum properties of different physical systems in well established technologies. This was motivated by the miniaturization of electronic devices. For very small systems, the laws of quantum mechanics start to govern their behavior and it is then to expect that for instance electronic components reach their "quantum limit". A good example of the introduction of quantum properties into conventional technologies is the case of the electron spin, which offers an alternative to electron-charge for the storage and transport of information in electronics. The idea of using electron spins in electronics gave rise to the new and exciting field of spintronics and was encouraged by experiments that showed coherent spin transport over long distances (over hundred micrometers) in semiconductors and long electron spin dephasing times. In addition to its applications in conventional technologies, the use of the electron spin as information-carrier has been suggested for the new field of quantum information processing. An important advantage of the electron spin with respect to other quantum information-carriers proposed is that it can profit from the well developed semiconductor industry and its related technologies. For the long-range transport of information, however, the highly interacting environment in solid-state devices represents a difficulty to the use of electron spins. In contrast, photons are very weekly coupled to their environment, and therefore more suitable for the transfer of information over long distances (on the order of kilometers), required, for instance, in quantum communication. Furthermore, the technology needed for the transport of photons over such long distances is well developed. Thus, an efficient transfer of quantum information between electron spins and photons is highly desirable. \n \nIn this dissertation, we show that the transfer of entanglement, a quantum correlation, from electron spins to the polarization of photons is not only theoretically possible, but also feasible under realistic experimental conditions. We study the transport of an entangled pair of electron spins through Fermi leads which split them spatially until they reach spin-LEDs, semiconductor structures containing quantum dots. In these structures, the electrons optically recombine with holes, producing then photons. We analyze the polarization state of the out-coming photons and give the conditions for which the entanglement of the electron spins is fully recovered in the photon-polarizations. We further show that it is possible to produce four-photon entanglement. \n \nWe also include in this work the study of coherent spin-transfer between quantum dots layers bridged by molecules. This study was motivated by an experiment showing that the molecules act not only as binders to construct the multilayer structures, but also as "wires" for the information through electron spins in the quantum dots. We show that a two-site Hamiltonian captures some of the essential features of the experiment. We calculate the dependence of the experimentally observed Faraday rotation (FR) signal as a function of probe energy on microscopic parameters such as spin transfer probabilities. The Faraday angle is related to the difference in the dielectric response for different polarizations of the light. We calculate the dielectric response functions of coupled quantum dots and derive an analytical expression for the FR angle in terms of electron transfer probabilities and Heisenberg exchange splittings.
In the last few years there has been a growing interest in the possible applications of quantum properties of different physical systems in well established technologies. This was motivated by the miniaturization of electronic devices. For very small systems, the laws of quantum mechanics start to govern their behavior and it is then to expect that for instance electronic components reach their "quantum limit". A good example of the introduction of quantum properties into conventional technologies is the case of the electron spin, which offers an alternative to electron-charge for the storage and transport of information in electronics. The idea of using electron spins in electronics gave rise to the new and exciting field of spintronics and was encouraged by experiments that showed coherent spin transport over long distances (over hundred micrometers) in semiconductors and long electron spin dephasing times. In addition to its applications in conventional technologies, the use of the electron spin as information-carrier has been suggested for the new field of quantum information processing. An important advantage of the electron spin with respect to other quantum information-carriers proposed is that it can profit from the well developed semiconductor industry and its related technologies. For the long-range transport of information, however, the highly interacting environment in solid-state devices represents a difficulty to the use of electron spins. In contrast, photons are very weekly coupled to their environment, and therefore more suitable for the transfer of information over long distances (on the order of kilometers), required, for instance, in quantum communication. Furthermore, the technology needed for the transport of photons over such long distances is well developed. Thus, an efficient transfer of quantum information between electron spins and photons is highly desirable. \n \nIn this dissertation, we show that the transfer of entanglement, a quantum correlation, from electron spins to the polarization of photons is not only theoretically possible, but also feasible under realistic experimental conditions. We study the transport of an entangled pair of electron spins through Fermi leads which split them spatially until they reach spin-LEDs, semiconductor structures containing quantum dots. In these structures, the electrons optically recombine with holes, producing then photons. We analyze the polarization state of the out-coming photons and give the conditions for which the entanglement of the electron spins is fully recovered in the photon-polarizations. We further show that it is possible to produce four-photon entanglement. \n \nWe also include in this work the study of coherent spin-transfer between quantum dots layers bridged by molecules. This study was motivated by an experiment showing that the molecules act not only as binders to construct the multilayer structures, but also as "wires" for the information through electron spins in the quantum dots. We show that a two-site Hamiltonian captures some of the essential features of the experiment. We calculate the dependence of the experimentally observed Faraday rotation (FR) signal as a function of probe energy on microscopic parameters such as spin transfer probabilities. The Faraday angle is related to the difference in the dielectric response for different polarizations of the light. We calculate the dielectric response functions of coupled quantum dots and derive an analytical expression for the FR angle in terms of electron transfer probabilities and Heisenberg exchange splittings.
The aim of this thesis is to theoretically investigate two possible applications of semiconductor quantum dots for the growing field of quantum information and communication. The first one is the generation of entangled photons, which can be created by the radiative recombination of a quantum dot biexciton. This non-classical state of light is for instance used for teleportation of quantum information over distance. Although other methods of creating entangled photons exist, they suffer from problems such as inefficiency and unreliability, and an alternative which can produce an entangled photon pair on-demand within a given time interval would be most welcome. The second application is the implementation of a quantum bit using the intrinsic angular momentum of a single electron confined to a quantum dot. The quantum bit is the basic element of any quantum computer and is used to store quantum information. The work is divided into four main parts. We begin with an introduction which contains a short description about entanglement and quantum information followed by a brief review about the electron structure of semiconductors. This review aims to provide knowledge about some key methods and results from the semiconductor physics, which we will need in the following chapters. In the second part we will turn our attention to the generation of entangled light by the recombination of semiconductor biexcitons, which are composed of two excitons. We will discover that the excitons show an energy structure which requires extending the semiconductor theory from the introduction to be able to properly describe the observed effects. Once the exciton energy structure is known, we will examine a method to improve the quality of the emitted light with respect to entanglement. The third part considers effects from interactions between nuclear and electron spins. Focusing on storing one quantum bit using a single electron spin, we investigate the possible loss of information caused by interaction with the nuclear spins. We find that the temporal fluctuations of the nuclear spins give rise to an upper limit on the electron coherence time, during which quantum information can be accurately stored. We also investigate possible techniques to reduce the fluctuations and prolong the coherence time. In the fourth part we combine knowledge about the nuclear spins with the biexciton recombination process to investigate what effect exciton-nuclear spin interaction has on the entangled light. We find that the interaction with nuclear spins degrades the entanglement of the emitted light. To restore the quality of the entanglement, we investigate the effect of polarizing the nuclear spins and find that this can improve the entanglement.
The interaction of electrons and photons lies at the heart of quantum physics. The \nmost notable phenomena which are described by quantum physics but which obviously \ninvalidate a classical description of the electromagnetic field - the photoelectric \neffect, the Compton effect, or the antibunching of photons emitted from a single atom, \nto mention a few - are intimately related to the interaction of electrons and photons. \nElectrons possess an internal degree of freedom, the spin. The spin S of an electron \ncan be described as an internal angular momentum, leading to a magnetic moment \nm due to the electric charge of the electron. Stern and Gerlach have shown that \nthe projection of m onto a quantization axis (defined by an external magnetic field \nin their experiment), e.g., along the z axis, is either mz = g�μB/2 (\\spin up") or \nmz = g�μB=2 (\\spin down"), where �μB � 9:2741 � 10-24 J/T is the Bohr magneton \nand g is the g-factor of the electron (g = 2 for free electrons). \n \n An electron spin \nis therefore usually referred to as a two-level system. Due to this property, the \nspin of electrons which are localized in semiconductor quantum dots has recently \nattracted significant attention regarding the implementation of quantum information \nprocessing: Electron spins can be used as carriers of quantum information. One \ncan define that the spin pointing "up" corresponds to the logical value "0" and \nthe spin pointing "down" corresponds to "1". Moreover, because the electron spin \nis a quantum mechanical property one can form arbitrary coherent superpositions of \n"up" and "down" with a single spin. Moreover, because the electron spin \nis a quantum mechanical property one can form arbitrary coherent superpositions of \n"up" and "down" with a single spin. A system with this property is called a quantum \nbit (qubit). The additional possibilities due to quantum superpositions of qubits are \nexploited, e.g., in the algorithms introduced by Shor and Grover to solve certain tasks \nmuch more efficiently than with a classical computer (i.e., the prime factorization of \nlarge numbers for Shor's algorithm and the search within an unstructured database for \nGrover's algorithm). While quantum computation has presently only been achieved \nin prototypical experiments with few qubits, the implementation of efficient largescale \nquantum computation with many qubits still remains an extremely demanding \ntask. Yet, other quantum mechanical properties of qubits, such as entanglement, \nhave already been exploited experimentally with photons in quantum communication \nschemes, for example, quantum teleportation and quantum data compression. \nIn this thesis, we investigate the interaction of electrons and photons in semiconductor \nquantum dots. Optical transitions in quantum dots enable a direct link between \nelectron spins and photon polarizations due to conservation laws. We show that \n \nentanglement can be transferred from electron spin qubits to qubits defined by the \nphoton polarization, enabling the measurement of entangled spin states via photons. \nThe mechanism under study can also be used for the production of entangled photons, \nfor instance for the implementation of quantum communication protocols. In contrast \nto the presently used sources of entangled photons, the photon source we propose here \nis deterministic, providing entangled photons on demand. It has been demonstrated \nin several recent experiments that the most obvious way to achieve such a transfer of \nentanglement - using the recombination of biexcitons in a single quantum dot - fails \nin the presently available quantum dot structures. We have analyzed the problems \nof this approach. As a solution, we propose schemes based on charged excitons in \nsingle or coupled quantum dots. We discuss the generation of entangled two- and \nfour-photon states. \nIn addition to the transfer of quantum states, photons can also be used to probe \nelectron spin states. We investigate in detail different methods to optically measure \nthe decoherence time of a single electron spin in a quantum dot. The decoherence time \nof a spin establishes the time scale during which coherent manipulation is possible. \nMeasurements of the electron spin decoherence time are therefore highly desirable \nin view of the implementation of spin-based quantum information processing. We \nshow that the schemes we propose can be implemented with current experimental \ntechniques. \nWe then study the magneto-optical effect called Faraday rotation. Using the technique \nof time-resolved Faraday rotation, a recent experiment has demonstrated the \ncoherent transfer of spin between quantum dots coupled by molecules. We calculate \nthe Faraday rotation signal for a coupled dot system and show that a two-site \nHamiltonian with a transfer term captures the essential features observed in this experiment. \nWe also present results for a system of two coupled dots doped with a \nsingle electron. \nWe finally show that the coupled states of two qubits can be detected via the optical \ninteraction with a cavity in the dispersive regime. We present a Schrieffer-Wolff \ntransformation which removes the coupling of the two qubits to the cavity in leading \norder. The different two-qubit states lead to a different spectral shift of the cavity \nline. For a sufficiently low cavity linewidth, this enables the direct readout of a \ntwo-qubit system.
The recent discovery of efficient quantum algorithms for factoring and database search has shown that quantum computing would allow to solve important problems which are intractable with conventional computers. In contrast to the very demanding task of building a large-scale quantum computer, there are quantum communication protocols, e.g. quantum key distribution for cryptography, which—though still difficult—require much less effort and can be implemented with current technology. Apart from the technological motivation, the study of quantum information offers (at least) two additional benefits. First, new insight into fundamental questions on quantum mechanics, e.g. concerning non-locality and entanglement, are gained from an information-theoretical approach. And second, investigating a particular physical implementation of quantum information can give rise to independent physical results. Spintronics, the use of spin as opposed to charge in (classical) electronics is a new field for which some results presented here could be relevant. In this dissertation we investigate several theoretical aspects of the physical implementation of quantum computation and communication in which the fundamental unit of quantum information, the qubit, is represented by the spin of electrons in semiconductor quantum dots. The required coupling between the spins can be obtained by allowing for tunneling of electrons between adjacent dots, leading to a Heisenberg exchange coupling J S1 · S2 between the spins, a scenario which we study for laterally coupled quantum dots in a two-dimensional electron system, and for a three-dimensional setup with vertically coupled quantum dots. Furthermore, an alternative scheme to couple the spins via the interaction with an optical cavity mode is presented. Quantum error correction represents one of the important ingredients for the physical implementation of a quantum computer by protecting \nit from the e�ects of a noisy environment. As a �rst test for errorcorrection \nin a solid-state device using spins, we propose an optimized \nimplementation of the most primitive error correction scheme (the threebit \ncode). In this context, we introduce parallel switching, allowing \nto operate a quantum computer more e�ciently than the usual serial \nswitching. \nCoupling spins with the exchange interaction J S1 �S2 is not su�cient \nfor quantum computation; the spins also have to be addressed individually \nusing controllable local magnetic �elds or g-factors giBi �Si in order \nto allow for single-qubit operations. On the one hand, we discuss several \nschemes for overcoming the di�culty of applying local magnetic �elds \n(requiring large gradients), e.g. g-factor engineering, which allows for \nall-electric operation of the device. On the other hand, we show that \nat the expense of additional devices (spins) and switching operations, \nsingle-spin rotations can be dispensed with completely. \nAddressing the feasibility of quantum communication with entangled \nelectrons in mesoscopic wires, i.e. interacting many-body environments, \nwe propose an interference experiment using a scattering set-up with an \nentangler and a beam splitter. The current noise for electronic singlet \nstates turns out to be enhanced (bunching), while it is reduced for triplets \n(antibunching). Due to interactions, the �delity of the entangled singlet \nand triplet states is reduced by z4F \nin a conductor described by Fermi \nliquid theory, zF being the quasiparticle weight factor. \nFinally, we study the related but more general problem of the noise of \nthe cotunneling current through one or several tunnel-coupled quantum \ndots in the Coulomb blockade regime. The various regimes of weak and \nstrong, elastic and inelastic cotunneling are analyzed for quantum-dot \nsystems (QDS) with few-level, nearly-degenerate, and continuous electronic \nspectra. In contrast to sequential tunneling, the noise in inelastic \ncotunneling can be super-Poissonian. In order to investigate strong cotunneling \nwe develop a microscopic theory of cotunneling based on the \ndensity-operator formalism and using the projection operator technique. \nWe have derived the master equation for the QDS and the current and \nnoise in cotunneling in terms of the stationary state of the QDS. These \nresults are then applied to QDS with a nearly degenerate and continuous \nspectrum.
Spin is a quantum property of electrons. For spin-based quantum information technology, preparation and read-out of the electron spin state should be spin coherent. We demonstrate that the polarization coher ence of light can be transferred to the spin coherence of electrons in a semiconductor quantum nanostructure [1], and the prepared coherence of the electron spin can also be read out with light by the developed tomographic Kerr rotation method [2]. We also demonstrate that a single photon is efficiently converted (~27%) into a single electron trapped in a gate-defined quantum dot, where the g-factor of electrons is tuned to zero, and the charge state is detected with an adjacent quantum point contact without destructing the spin state [3]. We further demonstrate that the spin coherence of a single electron trapped in one of double quantum dots is electrically manipulated with a microwave applied to the gate and read out via the Pauli spin blockade phenomenon [4]. These demonstrations were carried out in a condition where the up/down spin basis states of electrons remain ed degenerated under an in-plain magnetic field. As this condition ensures the energy conservation between photons and electrons, the entire Poincare sphere representing polarization states of photons can be mapped onto the Bloch sphere representing spin polar ization states of electrons. We theoretically showed that relative spin coherence of two electrons can be also measured with the help of spin-flip tunneling of electrons between the dots [5]. Full Bell state measurement is also possible by the single -spin manipulation and Pauli spin blockade [6]. All of these functions are needed to build all semiconductor quantum repeaters and distributed quantum computers.
New technologies based on the properties of quantum mechanics promise to revolutionise the way information is processed by outperforming what is possible using classical devices. Examples include massively parallel processing using quantum computers, verifiably secure communication using quantum cryptography, and measurement with sensitivity beyond classical limitation with quantum metrology. Realising the full potential of these technologies necessitates the ability to communicate quantum information over large distances, a key requirement for future quantum networks. However, developing practical implementations of long-distance quantum communication is challenging as it necessitates three major ingredients: light-matter interfaces, elementary quantum operations, and quantum memories. This thesis describes work that has been undertaken to address these requirements using semiconductor nanotechnology. We have first demonstrated that single InAs quantum dots embedded inside conventional diode structures constitute high-fidelity controllable interfaces between optical qubits and solid-state qubits. Indeed, the polarisation state of a photon was transferred into the spin state of an electron-hole pair and eventually restored through radiative recombination of the electron and the hole with a fidelity up to 95%. Moreover, spins were manipulated using subnanosecond modulation of a vertical electric field applied to the quantum dots. By controlling this electrical modulation, we demonstrated elementary phase-shift and spin-flip gate operations with near-unity fidelities. An electron-hole pair confi ned in a single quantum dot has a short radiative lifetime limiting therefore its use as an excitonic quantum memory. The solution we proposed was to use a quantum dot molecule to control the spatial separation of the electron and the hole and therefore prevent their recombination. Comprehensive studies of electric field eff ects upon the photoluminescence of quantum dot molecules lead to a clear understanding and a good control over their physical properties. Single photons were stored in individual quantum dot molecules up to 1μs and read out on a subnanosecond time scale. Moreover, the circular polarisation of individual photons was transferred into the spin state of electron-hole pairs with a fidelity above 90%, which does not degrade for storage times up to the 12.5 ns repetition period of the experiment. Our work on single quantum dots could be extended in the near future to allow for two-qubits quantum operations by con fining a second electron-hole pair to be electrically manipulated. Storage of a superposition of spin states in a quantum dot molecule should also be possible if the spin states are made degenerate, which is feasible using the electric fi eld dependence of the energy splitting between the spin states discussed in this thesis. We believe that combining both approaches will lead to the development of a controllable multi-qubit quantum memory for polarised light, a building block for long distance quantum communication based on semiconductor nanotechnology.
The transmission of quantum information over long distances will allow new forms of data security, based on quantum cryptography. These new technologies rely for security on the quantum "uncertainty principle" and on the long distance transmission of "quantum entanglement". A new type of tele-communications device called the "quantum repeater" can allow the faithful transmission of quantum information over worldwide distances, in spite of the inevitably severe losses while propagating along optical fibers. In a quantum repeater, information is stored in the quantum state of a semiconductor electron spin, while complementary entangled information is transmitted as a photon down the optical fiber. This long-range entanglement permits the execution of the teleportation algorithm, which accurately transmits a quantum state over long distances. The basis for an opto-electronic quantum repeater is an entanglement preserving InP photodetector with special selection rules, in which polarization information from a photon is transferred to spin polarization information of a photo-electron, and vice versa. Nevertheless, the algorithm requires that the photo-electron be transferred to a group IV semiconductor for long time storage since there is rapid loss of quantum information in III-V semiconductors. This paper reviews the experimental status of semiconductor quantum repeaters, including the spin resonance transistor logic gates, and the experimental detection of single photons in a manner that preserves their spin information.