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Fast spin information transfer between distant quantum dots using individual electrons

Nature Nanotechnology volume 11, pages 672–676 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

Transporting ensembles of electrons over long distances without losing their spin polarization is an important benchmark for spintronic devices. It usually requires injecting and probing spin-polarized electrons in conduction channels using ferromagnetic contacts1,2 or optical excitation3,4,5. In parallel with this development, important efforts have been dedicated to achieving control of nanocircuits at the single-electron level. The detection and coherent manipulation of the spin of a single electron trapped in a quantum dot are now well established6,7,8. Combined with the recently demonstrated control of the displacement of individual electrons between two distant quantum dots9,10, these achievements allow the possibility of realizing spintronic protocols at the single-electron level. Here, we demonstrate that spin information carried by one or two electrons can be transferred between two quantum dots separated by a distance of 4 μm with a classical fidelity of 65%. We show that at present it is limited by spin flips occurring during the transfer procedure before and after electron displacement. Being able to encode and control information in the spin degree of freedom of a single electron while it is being transferred over distances of a few micrometres on nanosecond timescales will pave the way towards ‘quantum spintronics’ devices, which could be used to implement large-scale spin-based quantum information processing.

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Figure 1: Experimental set-up and characterizations of quantum dots.
Figure 2: Local spin relaxation measurements in the reception dot and electron transfer between the source and reception dots.
Figure 3: Non-local spin relaxation measurements.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge technical support from the technological centres of the Institut Néel. S.Tak. acknowledges financial support from Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement no. 654603. M.Y. and S.Tar. acknowledge financial support from JSPS (grant nos. 26247050, 25610070 and 26220710). S.Tar. acknowledges financial support from MEXT KAKENHI ‘Quantum Cybernetics’, MEXT project for Developing Innovation Systems, and the JST Strategic International Cooperative. A.L. and A.D.W. acknowledge support from BMBF Q.com-H 16KIS0109, Mercur Pr-2013-0001 and DFH/UFA CDFA-05-06. B.B. and T.M. acknowledge financial support from ERC ‘QSPINMOTION’ and the Fondation Nanosciences.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Université Grenoble Alpes, Institut NEEL, Grenoble, F-38042, France

    B. Bertrand, S. Hermelin, S. Takada, C. Bäuerle & T. Meunier

  2. CNRS, Institut NEEL, Grenoble, F-38042, France

    B. Bertrand, S. Hermelin, S. Takada, C. Bäuerle & T. Meunier

  3. Department of Applied Physics, University of Tokyo, Tokyo, 113-8656, Japan

    S. Takada, M. Yamamoto & S. Tarucha

  4. PRESTO-JST, Kawaguchi-shi, Saitama, 331-0012, Japan

    M. Yamamoto

  5. RIKEN Center for Emergent Matter Science (CEMS), 2-1 Hirosawa, Wako-Shi, Saitama, 31-0198, Japan

    S. Tarucha

  6. Lehrstuhl für Angewandte Festkörperphysik, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universitätsstrasse 150, Bochum, 44780, Germany

    A. Ludwig & A. D. Wieck

Authors
  1. B. Bertrand
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  2. S. Hermelin
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  8. C. Bäuerle
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  9. T. Meunier
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Contributions

B.B. performed the experiments. B.B. and T.M. interpreted the data. B.B., C.B. and T.M. wrote the manuscript. S.Tak. designed and fabricated the sample with M.Y. and S.Tar. S.H. contributed to the experimental set-up. A.L. and A.D.W. provided the high-mobility heterostructures. All authors discussed the results and contributed to writing the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to T. Meunier.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Bertrand, B., Hermelin, S., Takada, S. et al. Fast spin information transfer between distant quantum dots using individual electrons. Nature Nanotech 11, 672–676 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2016.82

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