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arXiv:cond-mat/0303590

Full counting statistics in electric circuits

Kindermann, Markus, Yuli V. Nazarov

Published Mar 27, 2003• 0 citations
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Abstract

We review several ways of defining the statistics of charge that is transmitted through an electric circuit, the so-called "counting statistics". We first pursue two approaches that explain the origin of "negative probabilities" that have been found earlier in this context. The first analysis involves degrees of freedom of the electric circuit only. In the second approach an idealized charge detector is introduced. We study then general linear detectors and how their back action on the electric conductor affects the statistics of transferred charge. Phase-coherent conductors in the presence of an electromagnetic environment are studied within a Keldysh action approach.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.cond-mat/0303590

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We study fluctuations of electric current in a quantum resistor and derive a general quantum-mechanical formula for the distribution of transmitted charge. For that we introduce a scheme of current measurement that involves a spin 1/21/21/2 coupled to the current so that it precesses at the rate proportional to the current. Our approach allows the study of charge transfer without breaking the circuit. We analyze a single channel conductor and derive electron counting statistics for arbitrary relation between temperature and voltage. For a perfectly transmitting channel the counting distribution is gaussian, both for zero-point fluctuations and at finite temperature. At constant voltage and low temperature the distribution is binomial, i.e., it arises from Bernoulli statistics.
A theory of electron counting statistics in quantum transport is presented. It involves an idealized scheme of current measurement using a spin 1/2 coupled to the current so that it precesses at the rate proportional to the current. Within such an approach, counting charge without breaking the circuit is possible. As an application, we derive the counting statistics in a single channel conductor at finite temperature and bias. For a perfectly transmitting channel the counting distribution is Gaussian, both for zero-point fluctuations and at finite temperature. At constant bias and low temperature the distribution is binomial, i.e., it arises from Bernoulli statistics. Another application considered is the noise due to short current pulses that involve few electrons. We find the time-dependence of the driving potential that produces coherent noise-minimizing current pulses, and display analogies of such current states with quantum-mechanical coherent states.
The counting statistics (CS) for charges passing through a coherent conductor comprise the most general quantity that characterizes electronic transport. The CS depend not only on the transport properties of the conductor, but also on the correlations among particles which compose the incident beam. In this paper we present general results for the CS of entangled electron pairs traversing a beam splitter, and we show that the probability that Q charges have passed is not binomial, as in the uncorrelated case, but is symmetric with respect to the average transferred charge. We furthermore consider the joint probability for transmitted charges of a given spin, and we show that the signature of entanglement distinctly appears in a correlation which is not present for a nonentangled case.
We show that the standard Keldysh formulation of full counting statistics breaks down, when trying to interpret it directly in terms of a probability for time-dependent currents, since it leads to negative probability density. We propose a positive operator valued measure, which effectively accounts for some detector dynamics, but reproduces the Keldysh result in the low-frequency limit. However, the detector dynamics adds a large white Gaussian detection noise, which should be visible in experiment. The original negative probability can be measured indirectly by two independent detectors.
We discuss the full counting statistics (FCS) of noncommuting variables with the measurement of successive spin counts in noncollinear directions taken as an example. We show that owing to an irreducible detector back action, the FCS in this case may be sensitive to the dynamics of the detectors, and may differ from the predictions obtained with using a naive version of the projection postulate. We present here a general model of detector dynamics and path-integral approach to the evaluation of FCS. We concentrate further on a simple ``diffusive'' model of the detector dynamics where the FCS can be evaluated with transfer-matrix method. The resulting probability distribution of spin counts is characterized by anomalously large higher cumulants and substantially deviates from Gaussian statistics.