Perpendicular-to-Parallel Spin Reorientation in a Mn-Doped GaAs Quantum Canting or Phase Separation

Abstract

It is well known that the magnetic anisotropy in a compressively-strained Mn-doped GaAs film changes from perpendicular to parallel with increasing hole concentration p. We study this reorientation transition at T = 0 for a quantum well with Mn impurities confined to the z = 0 plane. With increasing p, the angle 0 that minimizes the energy E increases continuously from 0 (perpendicular anisotropy) to /2 (parallel anisotropy) within some range of p. The shape of Emin(p) suggests that the quantum well becomes phase separated with regions containing low hole concentrations and perpendicular moments interspersed with other regions containing high hole concentrations and parallel moments. However, consideration of the Coulomb energy costs associated with phase separation suggests that the true magnetic state in the transition region is canted with 0 < < /2.