Laterally localizing potential as a tool for controlling the electron spin relaxation time in GaAs quantum wells

The coherent spin dynamics of electrons localized in a plane of GaAs quantum wells is studied experimentally by the application of an electrically controlled potential. The localizing potential is produced with the use of a metal gate with submicrometer windows deposited onto the sample surface. The photoinduced spin Kerr effect is used to study the electron spin lifetime as a function of the temperature, applied bias, and magnetic field for gates with different sets of windows. It is shown that, with an electrically controlled laterally localizing potential, it is possible to gradually change the electron spin lifetime from several hundreds of picoseconds to several tens of nanoseconds. The dependence of the electron spin relaxation time on the sizes of the lateral localization region is in good qualitative agreement with theoretical prediction.