We report a strong correlation between the location of Mn sites in ferrromagnetic Ga 1-x Mn x As measured by channeling Rutherford backscattering and by particle induced x-ray emission experiments and its Curie temperature. The concentrations of free holes determined by electrochemical capacitance-voltage profiling and of uncompensated Mn ++ spins determined from SQUID magnetization measurements are found to depend on the concentration of unstable defects involving highly mobile Mn interstitials. This leads to large variations in T C of Ga 1-x Mn x As when it is annealed at different temperatures in a narrow temperature range. The fact that annealing under various conditions has failed to produce Curie temperatures above ~110K is attributed to the existence of an upper limit on the free hole concentration in low-temperature-grown Ga 1-x Mn x As.

Large, well-defined magnetic domains, on the scale of hundreds of micrometers, are observed in Ga1-xMn(x)As epilayers using a high-resolution magneto-optical imaging technique. The orientations of the magnetic moments in the domains clearly show in-plane magnetic anisotropy, which changes through a second-order transition from a biaxial mode (easy axes nearly along [100] and [010]) at low temperatures to an unusual uniaxial mode (easy axis along [110]) as the temperature increases above about T(c)/2. This transition is a result of the interplay between the natural cubic anisotropy of the GaMnAs zinc-blende structure and a uniaxial anisotropy which attribute to the effects of surface reconstruction.

The mechanisms for generation of long-lived spin coherence in a two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG) have been studied experimentally by means of a picosecond pump-probe Kerr rotation technique. CdTe/(Cd,Mg)Te quantum wells with a diluted 2DEG were investigated. The strong Coulomb interaction between electrons and holes, which results in large binding energies of neutral excitons and negatively charged excitons (trions), allows one to address selectively the exciton or trion states by resonant optical excitation. Different scenarios of spin coherence generation were analyzed theoretically, among them the direct trion photocreation, the formation of trions from photogenerated excitons and the electron-exciton exchange scattering. Good agreement between experiment and theory is found.

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