Optical detection of single electron transport dynamics

Abstract

The unpredictability of a single quantum event lies at the very core of quantum mechanics. Physical information is therefore drawn from a statistical evaluation of many such processes. Nevertheless, recording each single quantum event in a time trace the "random telegraph signal" is of great value, as it allows insight into the underlying physical system. Here, quantum dots have proven to be well suited systems, as they exhibit both single photon emission and single electron charge transport. While single photon emission is generally studied on self-assembled quantum dots, single electron transport studies are focused on gate-defined structures. We investigate, on a single self-assembled quantum dot, the single electron transport in the optical telegraph signal with high bandwidth and observe in the full counting statistics the interplay between charge and spin dynamics in a noninvasive way. In particular, we are able to identify the spin relaxation of the Zeeman-split quantum-dot level in the charge statistics.