The quadrupole mechanism of hole spin relaxation

For spin-3/2 holes the anisotropic part of the instantaneous Luttinger Hamiltonian can be represented as an effective quadrupole coupling. We investigate the hole spin relaxation process induced by nonadiabatic fluctuations of this interaction. The obtained analytical solution of the stochastic Liouville equation describes the polarization decay of spin-3/2 holes in all regimes of momentum scattering: from collision-dominated to ballistic. Our results create the basis for quantitative interpretation of recent experiments and elucidate the striking difference between the hole spin relaxation process in bulk crystals and 2D semiconductor nanostructures.