David Awschalom
Professor of Physics, Electical & Computer Engineering
University of California - Santa Barbara


Talk Title: "Manipulating Quantum Information with Semiconductor Spintronics"

Abstract
There is a growing interest in exploiting electronic and nuclear spins in semiconductor nanostructures for the manipulation and storage of information in emergent technologies based upon spintronics and quantum logic. Such schemes offer qualitatively new scientific and technological opportunities by combining elements of standard electronics with spin-dependent interactions between electrons, nuclei, electric and magnetic fields. Here we provide an overview of recent developments in the field through a discussion of temporally- and spatially-resolved measurements, initially designed for probing local moment dynamics in magnetically doped semiconductor nanostructures. We demonstrate new electrical schemes for the generation and manipulation of spins in conventional semiconductor heterostructures, thereby providing a compelling proof-of-concept that quantum spin information can be controlled within high-speed electrical circuits. Furthermore, we discuss a different "bottom-up" experimental approach that enables the molecular wiring and assembly of colloidal semiconductor nanostructures to engineer hybrid systems for room temperature coherent spin transport. These experiments explore electronic, photonic, and magnetic control of spin in a variety of nanostructures, and show significant steps towards spin-based quantum information processing in the solid state.

Biographical Sketch
Professor David D. Awschalom received his B.Sc. in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and his Ph.D. in experimental physics from Cornell University. He was a Research Staff member and Manager of the Nonequilibrium Physics Department at the IBM Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York. In 1991 he joined the University of California-Santa Barbara as a Professor of Physics, and in 2001 was additionally appointed as a Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He is presently Director of the Center for Spintronics and Quantum Computation, and Associate Director of the California Nanosystems Institute. His group has research activities in optical and magnetic interactions in semiconductor quantum structures, spin dynamics and coherence in condensed matter systems, macroscopic quantum phenomena in nanometer-scale magnets, and implementations of quantum information processing in the solid state. Professor Awschalom received an IBM Outstanding Innovation Award (1987), the Outstanding Investigator Prize from the Materials Research Society (1992), the International Magnetism Prize from the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics (2003), the Oliver E. Buckley Prize from the American Physical Society (2005), and the Agilent Europhysics Prize from the European Physical Society (2005). He is the founding Editor of the AIP Virtual Journal of Nanoscience and Technology, and is on the Editorial Advisory Boards of Physics Reports, Nanoletters, and the Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials. Dr. Awschalom is a member of the National Academies Solid State Sciences Committee, the AAAS, the MRS, and is a Fellow of the APS.

URL: http://www.physics.ucsb.edu/~awschalom

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