All-electrical control of single ion spins in a semiconductor

Abstract

We propose a method for all-electrical manipulation of single ion spins substituted into a semiconductor. Mn ions with a bound hole in GaAs form a natural example. Direct electrical manipulation of the ion spin is possible, because electric fields manipulate the orbital wave function of the hole, and through the spin-orbit coupling the spin is reoriented as well. Coupling ion spins can be achieved using gates to control the size of the hole wave function. Coherent manipulation of ionic spins may find applications in high-density storage and in scalable coherent or quantum information processing. © 2006 The American Physical Society.