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arXiv:1312.5177 · New Journal of Physics

Aharonov–Bohm interferometry with a tunnel-coupled wire

Amnon Aharony A, Shintaro Takada, Ora Entin-wohlman A, M Yamamoto, Seigo Tarucha

Published Aug 7, 2014• 19 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Recent experiments (Yamamoto et al 2012 Nature Nanotechnology 7 247 ) used the transport of electrons through an Aharonov–Bohm (AB) interferometer and two coupled channels (at both ends of the interferometer) to demonstrate a manipulable flying qubit. Results included in-phase and anti-phase (AB) oscillations of the two outgoing currents as a function of the magnetic flux, for strong and weak inter-channel coupling, respectively. Here we present new experimental results for a three terminal interferometer, with a tunnel coupling between the two outgoing wires. We show that in some limits, this system is an even simpler realization of the 'two-slit' experiment. We also present a simple tight-binding theoretical model which imitates the experimental setup. For weak inter-channel coupling, the AB oscillations in the current which is reflected from the device are very small, and therefore the oscillations in the two outgoing currents must cancel each other, yielding the anti-phase behavior, independent of the length of the coupling regime. Technically, the tight binding equations within the two coupled wires have four solutions for each electronic energy. In the 'anti-phase' region all of these solutions are wave-like, oscillating with the distance along the wires. As the coupling between the wires increases, two of these solutions become evanescent, and their amplitudes decay as the electron moves in the wires. In this regime, the amplitudes of the two remaining 'running' waves are proportional to each other, with a ratio which is practically flux-independent. As a result, the two outgoing currents are proportional to each other, yielding the 'in phase' behavior. For larger coupling all the solutions are evanescent, and the outgoing currents become very small.

DOI
10.1088/1367-2630/16/8/083015

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Recent experiments (Yamamoto et al 2012 Nature Nanotechnology 7 247 ) used the transport of electrons through an Aharonov–Bohm (AB) interferometer and two coupled channels (at both ends of the interferometer) to demonstrate a manipulable flying qubit. Results included in-phase and anti-phase (AB) oscillations of the two outgoing currents as a function of the magnetic flux, for strong and weak inter-channel coupling, respectively. Here we present new experimental results for a three terminal interferometer, with a tunnel coupling between the two outgoing wires. We show that in some limits, this system is an even simpler realization of the 'two-slit' experiment. We also present a simple tight-binding theoretical model which imitates the experimental setup. For weak inter-channel coupling, the AB oscillations in the current which is reflected from the device are very small, and therefore the oscillations in the two outgoing currents must cancel each other, yielding the anti-phase behavior, independent of the length of the coupling regime. Technically, the tight binding equations within the two coupled wires have four solutions for each electronic energy. In the 'anti-phase' region all of these solutions are wave-like, oscillating with the distance along the wires. As the coupling between the wires increases, two of these solutions become evanescent, and their amplitudes decay as the electron moves in the wires. In this regime, the amplitudes of the two remaining 'running' waves are proportional to each other, with a ratio which is practically flux-independent. As a result, the two outgoing currents are proportional to each other, yielding the 'in phase' behavior. For larger coupling all the solutions are evanescent, and the outgoing currents become very small.
Very much like the ubiquitous quantum interference of a single particle with itself, quantum interference of two independent, but indistinguishable, particles is also possible. This interference is a direct result of quantum exchange statistics, however, it is observed only in the joint probability to find the particles in two separated detectors. Here we report the first observation of such interference fringes between two independent and non-interacting electrons in an interferometer proposed by Yurke et al. and Samuelsson et al. Our experiment resembles the "Hanbury Brown and Twiss" (HBT) experiment, which was performed with classical waves. In the experiment, two independent and mutually incoherent electron beams were each partitioned into two trajectories. The combined four trajectories enclosed an Aharonov-Bohm (AB) flux (but not the two trajectories of a single electron). While individual currents were found to be independent of the AB flux, as expected, the cross-correlation between current fluctuations in two opposite points across the device exhibited strong AB oscillations. This is a direct signature of orbital entanglement between two electrons even though they never interact with each other.
We consider the phase-coherent transport of electrons passing through an Aharonov–Bohm ring while interacting with a tunnel charge in a double quantum dot (representing a charge qubit) which couples symmetrically to both arms of the ring. For Aharonov–Bohm flux Φ AB = h /2 e we find that electrons can only be transmitted when they flip the charge qubit's pseudospin parity an odd number of times. The perfect correlations of the dynamics of the pseudospin and individual electronic transmission and reflection events can be used to entangle the charge qubit with an individual passing electron.
We study complementarity in a two-terminal closed-loop Aharonov-Bohm interferometer with a quantum dot embedded in an arm of the ring and a nearby charge detector capacitively coupled to the quantum dot. We show that perfect charge detection does riot give full information of the electronic path, so it does not completely suppress the interference. We propose that this property can be verified even in the limit of weak charge detection by investigating the dephasing of the first and the second harmonics of the Aharonov-Bohm oscillation. The first harmonic of the AB oscillation is reduced monotonically as a function of the charge detection strength. In contrast, the second harmonic interference remains unaffected due to the fact that charge detection is not able to detect the electronic path responsible for the second harmonic. Our theory confirms that the particle-like behavior of an electron emerges from the path information itself rather than from the disturbance.
Abstract The phase gradient of the wave describing the Aharonov–Bohm effect (AB) is proportional to the local canonical momentum. This vector field contains vortices (phase singularities), whose strengths cannot be detected in quantum mechanics because they increase (discontinuously) with the magnetic flux, violating gauge invariance. The analogous quantity which is gauge-invariant is the kinetic momentum field, proportional to the local electron velocity. Investigation of the streamlines (integral curves) of this velocity field reveals that as the flux increases from 0 to 1/2 (in quantum units), a vortex V is generated at the flux line, accompanied by a stagnation point (saddle) S that emerges from V and then collapses back into V. The VS pair is always small: the maximum distance between V and S is approximately 0.0209 de Broglie wavelengths. The VS phenomenon survives generalization to a superposition of AB waves. If the flux is confined within an impenetrable tube of radius R , S persists if R < 0.004 de Broglie wavelengths, and is swallowed by the tube for larger R . An experiment is envisaged.
In 1984, 25 years after the prediction of the →Aharonov-Bohm (AB) effect, Aharonov and Casher [1] predicted a “dual ” effect. In both effects, a particle is excluded from a tubular region of space, but otherwise no force acts on it. Yet it acquires a measurable quantum phase that depends on what is inside the tube of space from which it is excluded. In the AB effect, the particle is charged and the tube contains a magnetic flux. In the Aharonov-Casher (AC) effect, the particle is neutral, but has a magnetic moment, and the tube contains a line of charge. Experiments in neutron [2], vortex [3], atom [4], and electron [5] interferometry bear out the prediction of Aharonov and Casher. Here we briefly explain the logic of the AC effect and how it is dual to the AB effect. We begin with a two-dimensional version of the AB effect. Figure 1 shows an electron moving in a plane, and also a “fluxon”, i.e. a small region of magnetic flux (pointing out of the plane) from which the electron is excluded. In Fig. 1 the fluxon is in a quantum superposition of two positions, and the electron diffracts around one of the positions but not the other. Initially, the fluxon and electron are in a
We investigated several classes of two coupled Aharonov-Bohm rings that share a finite center common path, where the phase of the electron wave function can be modulated by two distinct magnetic fluxes. The coupling is similar to two coupled atoms. The behavior of charge accumulation along the center common path or, equivalently, the bonding and anti-bonding of the two rings can be achieved as the two applied fluxes are varied. Thus, when three external terminals are connected to such coupled rings, the behavior of the electron transport is divided into several classes, depending on the number of atoms in each ring and the locations of the terminals. The results are presented here. The applicable electron wave computing circuits are discussed. In particular, a half-adder construction is shown here by employing the symmetric and anti-symmetric properties of the transmission of a given terminal when the sign of the flux is changed. The analogy of two coupled rings with respect to two spins allows one to make a further connection with traditional spintronics-based schemes.