No Arabic abstract
We report measurements of current noise in single- and multi-layer graphene devices. In four single-layer devices, including a p-n junction, the Fano factor remains constant to within +/-10% upon varying carrier type and density, and averages between 0.35 and 0.38. The Fano factor in a multi-layer device is found to decrease from a maximal value of 0.33 at the charge-neutrality point to 0.25 at high carrier density. These results are compared to theoretical predictions for shot noise in ballistic and disordered graphene.
We have investigated shot noise and conductance of multi-terminal graphene nanoribbon devices at temperatures down to 50 mK. Away from the charge neutrality point, we find a Fano factor $F approx 0.4$, nearly independent of the charge density. Our shot noise results are consistent with theoretical models for disordered graphene ribbons with a dimensionless scattering strength $K_0 approx 10$ corresponding to rather strong disorder. Close to charge neutrality, an increase in $F$ up to $sim 0.7$ is found, which indicates the presence of a dominant Coulomb gap possibly due to a single quantum dot in the transport gap.
When subjected to electromagnetic radiation, the fluctuation of the electronic current across a quantum conductor increases. This additional noise, called photon-assisted shot noise, arises from the generation and subsequent partition of electron-hole pairs in the conductor. The physics of photon-assisted shot noise has been thoroughly investigated at microwave frequencies up to 20 GHz, and its robustness suggests that it could be extended to the Terahertz (THz) range. Here, we present measurements of the quantum shot noise generated in a graphene nanoribbon subjected to a THz radiation. Our results show signatures of photon-assisted shot noise, further demonstrating that hallmark time-dependant quantum transport phenomena can be transposed to the THz range.
Transport properties of graphene - superconductor junction has been studied extensively to understand the interplay of the relativistic Dirac quasiparticles and superconductivity. Though shot noise measurements in graphene has been performed to realize many theoretical predictions, both at zero magnetic field as well as quantum Hall (QH) regime, its junction with superconductor remain unexplored. Here, we have carried out the shot noise measurements in an edge contacted bilayer graphene - Niobium superconductor junction at zero magnetic field as well as QH regime. At the Dirac point we have observed a Fano factor ~ 1/3 above the superconducting gap and a transition to an enhanced Fano factor ~ 0.5 below the superconducting gap. By changing the carrier density we have found a continuous reduction of Fano factor for both types of carriers, however the enhancement of Fano factor within the superconducting gap by a factor of ~ 1.5 is always preserved. The enhancement of shot noise is also observed in the QH regime, where the current is carried by the edge state, below the critical magnetic field and within the superconducting gap. These observations clearly demonstrate the enhanced charge transport at the graphene-superconductor interface.
The inherent asymmetry of the electric transport in graphene is attributed to Klein tunneling across barriers defined by $textit{pn}$-interfaces between positively and negatively charged regions. By combining conductance and shot noise experiments we determine the main characteristics of the tunneling barrier (height and slope) in a high-quality suspended sample with Au/Cr/Au contacts. We observe an asymmetric resistance $R_{textrm{odd}}=100-70$ $Omega$ across the Dirac point of the suspended graphene at carrier density $|n_{rm G}|=0.3-4 cdot 10^{11}$ cm$^{-2}$, while the Fano factor displays a non-monotonic asymmetry in the range $F_{textrm{odd}} sim 0.03 - 0.1$. Our findings agree with analytical calculations based on the Dirac equation with a trapezoidal barrier. Comparison between the model and the data yields the barrier height for tunneling, an estimate of the thickness of the $textit{pn}$-interface $d < 20$ nm, and the contact region doping corresponding to a Fermi level offset of $sim - 18$ meV. The strength of pinning of the Fermi level under the metallic contact is characterized in terms of the contact capacitance $C_c=19 times 10^{-6}$ F/cm$^2$. Additionally, we show that the gate voltage corresponding to the Dirac point is given by the work function difference between the backgate material and graphene.
Owing to a linear and gapless band structure and a tunability of the charge carrier type, graphene offers a unique system to investigate transport of Dirac Fermions at p-n junctions (PNJs). In a magnetic field, combination of quantum Hall physics and the characteristic transport across PNJs leads to a fractionally quantized conductance associated with the mixing of electron-like and hole-like modes and their subsequent partitioning. The mixing and partitioning suggest that a PNJ could be used as an electronic beam-splitter. Here we report the shot noise study of the mode mixing process and demonstrate the crucial role of the PNJ length. For short PNJs, the amplitude of the noise is consistent with an electronic beam-splitter behavior, whereas, for longer PNJs, it is reduced by the energy relaxation. Remarkably, the relaxation length is much larger than typical size of mesoscopic devices, encouraging using graphene for electron quantum optics and quantum information processing.