Nonequilibrium transport through a vertical quantum dot in the absence of spin-flip energy relaxation

We investigate nonequilibrium transport in the absence of spin-flip energy relaxation in a few-electron quantum dot artificial atom. Novel nonequilibrium tunneling processes involving high-spin states, which cannot be excited from the ground state because of spin blockade, and other processes involving more than two charge states are observed. These processes cannot be explained by orthodox Coulomb blockade theory. The absence of effective spin relaxation induces considerable fluctuation of the spin, charge, and total energy of the quantum dot. Although these features are revealed clearly by pulse excitation measurements, they are also observed in conventional dc current characteristics of quantum dots.