26,247 research outputs found
Interaction Induced Quantum Valley Hall Effect in Graphene
We use Pseudo Quantum Electrodynamics (PQED) in order to describe the full
electromagnetic interaction of the p-electrons of graphene in a consistent 2D
formulation. We first consider the effect of this interaction in the vacuum
polarization tensor or, equivalently, in the current correlator. This allows us
to obtain the dc conductivity after a smooth zero-frequency limit is taken in
Kubo's formula.Thereby, we obtain the usual expression for the minimal
conductivity plus corrections due to the interaction that bring it closer to
the experimental value. We then predict the onset of an interaction-driven
spontaneous Quantum Valley Hall effect (QVHE) below a critical temperature of
the order of K. The transverse (Hall) valley conductivity is evaluated
exactly and shown to coincide with the one in the usual Quantum Hall effect.
Finally, by considering the effects of PQED, we show that the electron
self-energy is such that a set of P- and T- symmetric gapped electron energy
eigenstates are dynamically generated, in association with the QVHE.Comment: 5 pages + supplemental materia
Unitarity of theories containing fractional powers of the d'Alembertian operator
We examine the unitarity of a class of generalized Maxwell U(1) gauge
theories in (2+1) D containing the pseudodifferential operator
, for . We show that only Quantum
Electrodynamics (QED) and its generalization known as Pseudo Quantum
Electrodynamics (PQED), for which and , respectively,
satisfy unitarity. The latter plays an important role in the description of the
electromagnetic interactions of charged particles confined to a plane, such as
in graphene or in hetero-junctions displaying the quantum Hall effect.Comment: 6 pages, no figure
The low-mass population of the Rho Ophiuchi molecular cloud
Star formation theories are currently divergent regarding the fundamental
physical processes that dominate the substellar regime. Observations of nearby
young open clusters allow the brown dwarf (BD) population to be characterised
down to the planetary mass regime, which ultimately must be accommodated by a
successful theory. We hope to uncover the low-mass population of the Rho
Ophiuchi molecular cloud and investigate the properties of the newly found
brown dwarfs. We use near-IR deep images (reaching completeness limits of
approximately 20.5 mag in J, and 18.9 mag in H and Ks) taken with the Wide
Field IR Camera (WIRCam) at the Canada France Hawaii Telescope (CFHT) to
identify candidate members of Rho Oph in the substellar regime. A spectroscopic
follow-up of a small sample of the candidates allows us to assess their
spectral type, and subsequently their temperature and membership. We select 110
candidate members of the Rho Ophiuchi molecular cloud, from which 80 have not
previously been associated with the cloud. We observed a small sample of these
and spectroscopically confirm six new brown dwarfs with spectral types ranging
from M6.5 to M8.25
- âŠ