Spin decoherence from Hamiltonian dynamics in quantum dots

The dynamics of a spin-1/2 particle coupled to a nuclear spin bath through an isotropic Heisenberg interaction is studied as a model for the spin decoherence in quantum dots. The time-dependent polarization of the central spin is calculated as a function of the bath-spin distribution and the polarizations of the initial bath state. For short times, the polarization of the central spin shows a Gaussian decay, and at later times it is revived displaying nonmonotonic time dependence. The decoherence time scale depends on moments of the bath-spin distribuition, and also on the polarization strengths in various bath-spin channels. The bath polarizations have a tendency to increase the decoherence time scale. The effective dynamics of the central spin polarization is shown to be described by a master equation with non-Markovian features.