No Arabic abstract
Low-temperature transport properties of a lateral quantum dot formed by overlaying finger gates in a clean one-dimensional channel are investigated. Continuous and periodic oscillations superimposed upon ballistic conductance steps are observed, when the conductance G of the dot changes within a wide range 0<G<6e^2/h. Calculations of the electrostatics confirm that the measured periodic conductance oscillations correspond to successive change of the total charge of the dot by $e$. By modelling the transport it is shown that the progression of the Coulomb oscillations into the region G>2e^2/h may be due to suppression of inter-1D-subband scattering. Fully transmitted subbands contribute to coherent background of conductance, while sequential tunneling via weakly transmitted subbands leads to Coulomb charging of the dot.
We report the observation of Coulomb blockade in a quantum dot contacted by two quantum point contacts each with a single fully-transmitting mode, a system previously thought to be well described without invoking Coulomb interactions. At temperatures below 50 mK we observe a periodic oscillation in the conductance of the dot with gate voltage that corresponds to a residual quantization of charge. From the temperature and magnetic field dependence, we infer the oscillations are Mesoscopic Coulomb Blockade, a type of Coulomb blockade caused by electron interference in an otherwise open system.
We review the quantum interference effects in a system of interacting electrons confined to a quantum dot. The review starts with a description of an isolated quantum dot. We discuss the status of the Random Matrix theory (RMT) of the one-electron states in the dot, present the universal form of the interaction Hamiltonian compatible with the RMT, and derive the leading corrections to the universal interaction Hamiltonian. Next, we discuss a theoretical description of a dot connected to leads via point contacts. Having established the theoretical framework to describe such an open system, we discuss its transport and thermodynamic properties. We review the evolution of the transport properties with the increase of the contact conductances from small values to values $sim e^2/pihbar$. In the discussion of transport, the emphasis is put on mesoscopic fluctuations and the Kondo effect in the conductance.
We report measurements of the electron dephasing time extracted from the weak localization (WL) correction to the average conductance in an open AlGaAs/GaAs quantum dot from 1 K to 13 mK. In agreement with theoretical predictions but in contrast with previous measurements in quantum dots, the extracted dephasing time does not saturate at the lowest temperatures. We find that the dephasing time follows an inverse linear power law with temperature. We determine that the extraction of the dephasing time from WL is applicable down to our lowest temperatures, but extraction from finite magnetic field conductance fluctuations is complicated by charging effects below 13 mK.
We study a quantum dot connected to the bulk by single-mode junctions at almost perfect conductance. Although the average charge $elangle N rangle$ of the dot is not discrete, its spin remains quantized: $s=1/2$ or $s=0$, depending (periodically) on the gate voltage. This drastic difference from the conventional mixed-valence regime stems from the existence of a broad-band, dense spectrum of discrete levels in the dot. In the doublet state, the Kondo effect develops at low temperatures. We find the Kondo temperature $T_K$ and the conductance at $Tlesssim T_K$.
Electron pairing due to a repulsive Coulomb interaction in a triple quantum dot (TQD) is experimentally studied. It is found that electron pairing in two dots of a TQD is mediated by the third dot, when the third dot strongly couples with the other two via Coulomb repulsion so that the TQD is in the twofold degenerate ground states of (1, 0, 0) and (0, 1, 1) charge configurations. Using the transport spectroscopy that monitors electron transport through each individual dot of a TQD, we analyze how to achieve the degeneracy in experiments, how the degeneracy is related to electron pairing, and the resulting nontrivial behavior of electron transport. Our findings may be used to design a system with nontrivial electron correlations and functionalities.