Proposal for all-electrical measurement of T_1 in semiconductors

In an inhomogeneously doped magnetic semiconductor spin relaxation time T_1 can be determined by all-electrical measurements. Nonequilibrium spin injected in a magnetic p-n junction gives rise to the spin-voltaic effect where the nonequilibrium spin-induced charge current is very sensitive to T_1 and can flow even at no applied bias. It is proposed that T_1 can be determined by measuring the I-V characteristics in such a geometry. For a magnetic p-n junction where the results can be calculated analytically, it is in addition possible to extract the g-factor and the degree of injected carrier spin polarization.