147 research outputs found
Probing Spin-Polarized Currents in the Quantum Hall Regime
An experiment to probe spin-polarized currents in the quantum Hall regime is
suggested that takes advantage of the large Zeeman-splitting in the
paramagnetic diluted magnetic semiconductor zinc manganese selenide
(ZnMnSe). In the proposed experiment spin-polarized electrons are
injected by ZnMnSe-contacts into a gallium arsenide (GaAs) two-dimensional
electron gas (2DEG) arranged in a Hall bar geometry. We calculated the
resulting Hall resistance for this experimental setup within the framework of
the Landauer-B\"uttiker formalism. These calculations predict for 100%
spininjection through the ZnMnSe-contacts a Hall resistance twice as high as in
the case of no spin-polarized injection of charge carriers into a 2DEG for
filling factor . We also investigated the influence of the equilibration
of the spin-polarized electrons within the 2DEG on the Hall resistance. In
addition, in our model we expect no coupling between the contact and the 2DEG
for odd filling factors of the 2DEG for 100% spininjection, because of the
opposite sign of the g-factors of ZnMnSe and GaAs.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figure
Charge fluctuations in a quantum point contact attached to a superconducting lead
We show how to calculate the charge noise spectrum in a normal mesoscopic
conductor, which is capacitively coupled to a macroscopic gate, when this
conductor is attached to L normal leads and M superconducting leads, the only
restriction being that the superconducting leads must be at the same chemical
potential. We then proceed to examine results for a quantum point contact (QPC)
in a normal lead connecting to a superconductor. Of interest is the fluctuating
current in a gate capacitively coupled to a QPC. The results are compared with
the case when all leads are normal. We find a doubling of the equilibrium
charge fluctuations and a large enhancement (>2) in the current noise spectrum
to first order in |eV|, when a channel in the QPC is opening.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure
The Leading Particle Effect from Heavy-Quark Recombination
The leading particle effect in charm hadroproduction is an enhancement of the
cross section for a charmed hadron D in the forward direction of the beam when
the beam hadron has a valence parton in common with the D. The large D+/D-
asymmetry observed by the E791 experiment is an example of this phenomenon. We
show that the heavy-quark recombination mechanism provides an economical
explanation for this effect. In particular, the D+/D- asymmetry can be fit
reasonably well using a single parameter whose value is consistent with a
recent determination from charm photoproduction.Comment: Revtex file, 4 pages, 3 figure
Quantum shot-noise at local tunneling contacts on mesoscopic multiprobe conductors
New experiments that measure the low-frequency shot-noise spectrum at local
tunneling contacts on mesoscopic structures are proposed. The current
fluctuation spectrum at a single tunneling tip is determined by local partial
densities of states. The current-correlation spectrum between two tunneling
tips is sensitive to non-diagonal density of states elements which are
expressed in terms of products of scattering states of the conductor. Thus such
an experiment permits to investigate correlations of electronic wave functions.
We present specific results for a clean wire with a single barrier and for
metallic diffusive conductors.Comment: 4 pages REVTeX, 2 figure
Unusual conductance collapse in one-dimensional quantum structures
We report an unusual insulating state in one-dimensional quantum wires with a
non-uniform confinement potential. The wires consist of a series of closely
spaced split gates in high mobility GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructures. At certain
combinations of wire widths, the conductance abruptly drops over three orders
of magnitude, to zero on a linear scale. Two types of collapse are observed,
one occurring in multi-subband wires in zero magnetic field and one in single
subband wires in an in-plane field. The conductance of the wire in the collapse
region is thermally activated with an energy of the order of 1 K. At low
temperatures, the conductance shows a steep rise beyond a threshold DC
source-drain voltage of order 1 mV, indicative of a gap in the density of
states. Magnetic depopulation measurements show a decrease in the carrier
density with lowering temperature. We discuss these results in the context of
many-body effects such as charge density waves and Wigner crystallization in
quantum wires.Comment: 5 pages, 5 eps figures, revte
Shifting a Quantum Wire through a Disordered Crystal: Observation of Conductance Fluctuations in Real Space
A quantum wire is spatially displaced by suitable electric fields with
respect to the scatterers inside a semiconductor crystal. As a function of the
wire position, the low-temperature resistance shows reproducible fluctuations.
Their characteristic temperature scale is a few hundred millikelvin, indicating
a phase-coherent effect. Each fluctuation corresponds to a single scatterer
entering or leaving the wire. This way, scattering centers can be counted one
by one.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure
Quantum Point Contacts and Coherent Electron Focusing
I. Introduction
II. Electrons at the Fermi level
III. Conductance quantization of a quantum point contact
IV. Optical analogue of the conductance quantization
V. Classical electron focusing
VI. Electron focusing as a transmission problem
VII. Coherent electron focusing (Experiment, Skipping orbits and magnetic
edge states, Mode-interference and coherent electron focusing)
VIII. Other mode-interference phenomenaComment: #3 of a series of 4 legacy reviews on QPC'
Correlation and symmetry effects in transport through an artificial molecule
Spectral weights and current-voltage characteristics of an artificial
diatomic molecule are calculated, considering cases where the dots connected in
series are in general different. The spectral weights allow us to understand
the effects of correlations, their connection with selection rules for
transport, and the role of excited states in the experimental conductance
spectra of these coupled double dot systems (DDS). An extended Hubbard
Hamiltonian with varying interdot tunneling strength is used as a model,
incorporating quantum confinement in the DDS, interdot tunneling as well as
intra- and interdot Coulomb interactions. We find that interdot tunneling
values determine to a great extent the resulting eigenstates and corresponding
spectral weights. Details of the state correlations strongly suppress most of
the possible conduction channels, giving rise to effective selection rules for
conductance through the molecule. Most states are found to make insignificant
contributions to the total current for finite biases. We find also that the
symmetry of the structure is reflected in the I-V characteristics, and is in
qualitative agreement with experiment.Comment: 25 figure files - REVTEX - submitted to PR
Interaction Effects in a One-Dimensional Constriction
We have investigated the transport properties of one-dimensional (1D)
constrictions defined by split-gates in high quality GaAs/AlGaAs
heterostructures. In addition to the usual quantized conductance plateaus, the
equilibrium conductance shows a structure close to , and in
consolidating our previous work [K.~J. Thomas et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 77, 135
(1996)] this 0.7 structure has been investigated in a wide range of samples as
a function of temperature, carrier density, in-plane magnetic field
and source-drain voltage . We show that the 0.7
structure is not due to transmission or resonance effects, nor does it arise
from the asymmetry of the heterojunction in the growth direction. All the 1D
subbands show Zeeman splitting at high , and in the wide channel
limit the -factor is , close to that of bulk GaAs.
As the channel is progressively narrowed we measure an exchange-enhanced
-factor. The measurements establish that the 0.7 structure is related to
spin, and that electron-electron interactions become important for the last few
conducting 1D subbands.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figures (accepted in Phys. Rev. B
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