Magnon transport and spin current switching through quantum dots

We study the nonequilibrium spin current through a quantum dot consisting of two localized spin-1/2 coupled to two ferromagnetic insulators. The influence of an intra-dot magnetic field and exchange coupling, different dot-reservoir coupling configurations, and the influence of magnon chemical potential differences vs. magnetic field gradients onto the spin current are examined. We discuss various spin switching mechanisms and find that, in contrast to electronic transport, the spin current is very sensitive to the specific coupling configuration and band edges. In particular, we identify 1- and 2-magnon transport processes which can lead to resonances and antiresonances for the spin current.Comment: 10 pages, 15 figure

Influence of nano-mechanical properties on single electron tunneling: A vibrating Single-Electron Transistor

We describe single electron tunneling through molecular structures under the influence of nano-mechanical excitations. We develop a full quantum mechanical model, which includes charging effects and dissipation, and apply it to the vibrating C$_{60}$ single electron transistor experiment by Park {\em et al.} {[Nature {\bf 407}, 57 (2000)].} We find good agreement and argue vibrations to be essential to molecular electronic systems. We propose a mechanism to realize negative differential conductance using local bosonic excitations.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figure

Spin quantum tunneling in single molecular magnets: fingerprints in transport spectroscopy of current and noise

We demonstrate that transport spectroscopy of single molecular magnets shows signatures of quantum tunneling at low temperatures. We find current and noise oscillations as function of bias voltage due to a weak violation of spin selection rules by quantum tunneling processes. The interplay with Boltzmann suppression factors leads to fake resonances with temperature-dependent position which do not correspond to any charge excitation energy. Furthermore, we find that quantum tunneling can completely suppress transport if the easy-plane anisotropy has a high symmetry.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Non-Linear Transport through a Molecular Nanojunction

We present a simple model of electrical transport through a metal-molecule-metal nanojunction that includes charging effects as well as aspects of the electronic structure of the molecule. The interplay of a large charging energy and an asymmetry of the metal-molecule coupling can lead to various effects in non-linear electrical transport. In particular, strong negative differential conductance is observed under certain conditions.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figures, accepted by Europhys. Let

Quantum tunneling induced Kondo effect in single molecular magnets

We consider transport through a single-molecule magnet strongly coupled to metallic electrodes. We demonstrate that for half-integer spin of the molecule electron- and spin-tunneling \emph{cooperate} to produce both quantum tunneling of the magnetic moment and a Kondo effect in the linear conductance. The Kondo temperature depends sensitively on the ratio of the transverse and easy-axis anisotropies in a non-monotonic way. The magnetic symmetry of the transverse anisotropy imposes a selection rule on the total spin for the occurrence of the Kondo effect which deviates from the usual even-odd alternation.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Real-time renormalization group and cutoff scales in nonequilibrium applied to an arbitrary quantum dot in the Coulomb blockade regime

We apply the real-time renormalization group (RG) in nonequilibrium to an arbitrary quantum dot in the Coulomb blockade regime. Within one-loop RG-equations, we include self-consistently the kernel governing the dynamics of the reduced density matrix of the dot. As a result, we find that relaxation and dephasing rates generically cut off the RG flow. In addition, we include all other cutoff scales defined by temperature, energy excitations, frequency, and voltage. We apply the formalism to transport through single molecular magnets, realized by the fully anisotropic Kondo model (with three different exchange couplings J_x, J_y, and J_z) in a magnetic field h_z. We calculate the differential conductance as function of bias voltage V and discuss a quantum phase transition which can be tuned by changing the sign of J_x J_y J_z via the anisotropy parameters. Finally, we calculate the noise S(Omega) at finite frequency Omega for the isotropic Kondo model and find that the dephasing rate determines the height of the shoulders in dS(\Omega)/d Omega near Omega=V.Comment: 16 pages, 7 figure

Oscillatory dynamics and non-markovian memory in dissipative quantum systems

The nonequilibrium dynamics of a small quantum system coupled to a dissipative environment is studied. We show that (1) the oscillatory dynamics close to a coherent-to-incoherent transition is surprisingly different from the one of the classical damped harmonic oscillator and that (2) non-markovian memory plays a prominent role in the time evolution after a quantum quench.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure

Strong Tunneling in Double-Island Structures

We study the electron transport through a system of two low-capacitance metal islands connected in series between two electrodes. The work is motivated in part by experiments on semiconducting double-dots, which show intriguing effects arising from coherent tunneling of electrons and mixing of the single-electron states across tunneling barriers. In this article, we show how coherent tunneling affects metallic systems and leads to a mixing of the macroscopic charge states across the barriers. We apply a recently formulated RG approach to examine the linear response of the system with high tunnel conductances (up to 8e^2/h). In addition we calculate the (second order) cotunneling contributions to the non-linear conductance. Our main results are that the peaks in the linear and nonlinear conductance as a function of the gate voltage are reduced and broadened in an asymmetric way, as well as shifted in their positions. In the limit where the two islands are coupled weakly to the electrodes, we compare to theoretical results obtained by Golden and Halperin and Matveev et al. In the opposite case when the two islands are coupled more strongly to the leads than to each other, the peaks are found to shift, in qualitative agreement with the recent prediction of Andrei et al. for a similar double-dot system which exhibits a phase transition.Comment: 12 page