No Arabic abstract
Many-body correlations and macroscopic quantum behaviors are fascinating condensed matter problems. A powerful test-bed for the many-body concepts and methods is the Kondo model which entails the coupling of a quantum impurity to a continuum of states. It is central in highly correlated systems and can be explored with tunable nanostructures. Although Kondo physics is usually associated with the hybridization of itinerant electrons with microscopic magnetic moments, theory predicts that it can arise whenever degenerate quantum states are coupled to a continuum. Here we demonstrate the previously elusive `charge Kondo effect in a hybrid metal-semiconductor implementation of a single-electron transistor, with a quantum pseudospin-1/2 constituted by two degenerate macroscopic charge states of a metallic island. In contrast to other Kondo nanostructures, each conduction channel connecting the island to an electrode constitutes a distinct and fully tunable Kondo channel, thereby providing an unprecedented access to the two-channel Kondo effect and a clear path to multi-channel Kondo physics. Using a weakly coupled probe, we reveal the renormalization flow, as temperature is reduced, of two Kondo channels competing to screen the charge pseudospin. This provides a direct view of how the predicted quantum phase transition develops across the symmetric quantum critical point. Detuning the pseudospin away from degeneracy, we demonstrate, on a fully characterized device, quantitative agreement with the predictions for the finite-temperature crossover from quantum criticality.
We propose a universal quantum computing scheme in which the orthogonal qubit states $|0>$ and $|1>$ are identical in their single-particle spin and charge properties. Each qubit is contained in a single quantum dot and gate operations are induced all-electrically by changes in the confinement potential. Within the computational space, these qubits are robust against environmental influences that couple to the system through single-particle channels. Due to the identical spin and charge properties of the $|0>$, $|1>$ states, the lowest-order relaxation and decoherence rates $1/T_1$ and $1/T_2$, within the Born-Markov approximation, both vanish for a large class of environmental couplings. We give explicit pulse sequences for a universal set of gates (phase, $pi/8$, Hadamard, textsc{cnot}) and discuss state preparation, manipulation, and detection.
Quantum phase transitions are ubiquitous in many exotic behaviors of strongly-correlated materials. However the microscopic complexity impedes their quantitative understanding. Here, we observe thoroughly and comprehend the rich strongly-correlated physics in two profoundly dissimilar regimes of quantum criticality. With a circuit implementing a quantum simulator for the three-channel Kondo model, we reveal the universal scalings toward different low-temperature fixed points and along the multiple crossovers from quantum criticality. Notably, an unanticipated violation of the maximum conductance for ballistic free electrons is uncovered. The present charge pseudospin implementation of a Kondo impurity opens access to a broad variety of strongly-correlated phenomena.
We propose that two-channel orbital Kondo ``spin 1/2 conductance can be measured in a quantum dot at Coulomb Blockade with an odd number of electrons with contacts in a pillar configuration, if an orthogonal magnetic field induces an appropriate level crossing. At the zero-temperature strong coupling fixed point the conductance reaches the unitarity limit with a non-Fermi liquid sqrt(T)-law.
In 1909, Millikan showed that the charge of electrically isolated systems is quantized in units of the elementary electron charge e. Today, the persistence of charge quantization in small, weakly connected conductors allows for circuits where single electrons are manipulated, with applications in e.g. metrology, detectors and thermometry. However, quantum fluctuations progressively reduce the discreteness of charge as the connection strength is increased. Here we report on the full quantum control and characterization of charge quantization. By using semiconductor-based tunable elemental conduction channels to connect a micrometer-scale metallic island, the complete evolution is explored while scanning the entire range of connection strengths, from tunnel barrier to ballistic contact. We observe a robust scaling of charge quantization as the square root of the residual electron reflection probability across a quantum channel when approaching the ballistic critical point, which also applies beyond the regimes yet accessible to theory. At increased temperatures, the thermal fluctuations result in an exponential suppression of charge quantization as well as in a universal square root scaling, for arbitrary connection strengths, in agreement with expectations. Besides direct applications to improve single-electron functionalities and for the metal-semiconductor hybrids emerging in the quest toward topological quantum computing, the knowledge of the quantum laws of electricity will be essential for the quantum engineering of future nanoelectronic devices.
Tunneling conductance through two quantum dots, which are connected in series to left and right leads, is calculated by using the numerical renormalization group method. As the hopping between the dots increases from very small value, the following states continuously appear; (i) Kondo singlet state of each dot with its adjacent-site lead, (ii) singlet state between the local spins on the dots, and (iii) double occupancy in the bonding orbital of the two dots. The conductance shows peaks at the transition regions between these states. Especially, the peak at the boundary between (i) and (ii) has the unitarity limit value of $2e^{2}/h$ because of coherent connection through the lead-dot-dot-lead. For the strongly correlated cases, the characteristic energy scale of the coherent peak shows anomalous decrease relating to the quantum critical transition known for the two-impurity Kondo effect. The two dots systems give the new realization of the two-impurity Kondo problem.