Low power electric dipole spin resonance in silicon: theory*

Control of individual electron spins is one of the cornerstones of spin-based quantum technology. The application of ac magnetic fields allows to drive coherent spin rotations in electrons placed in gate-defined quantum dots, but there is a strong incentive to avoid magnetic driving since it is technically demanding and limits the Rabi frequency due to sample heating issues. Electric dipole spin resonance techniques, which harness some type of spin-orbit coupling to electrically control the electron spin state, provide a more robust possibility [1,2]. Since the intrinsic spin- orbit coupling for electrons in silicon is very weak, the development of novel efficient tools for spin control applicable to silicon based quantum devices is desirable [2-5]. Here, we present a theoretical investigation of an efficient novel mechanism in silicon quantum dots to induce single electron coherent spin rotations relying on an external magnetic field gradient.

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[2] M. Pioro-Ladriere et al., Nat. Phys. 4, 776 (2008).
[3] A. Corna et al., npj Quantum Information 6, 4 (2018).
[4] E. Kawakami et al., Nat. Nanotech. 9, 666 (2014).
[5] Yoneda et al., Nat. Nanotech. 13, 102 (2018).