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arXiv:cond-mat/9904067 · Physical Review Letters

Quantum Dots in Magnetic Fields: Phase Diagram and Broken Symmetry at the Maximum-Density-Droplet Edge

S. M. Reimann, M. Koskinen, M. Manninen, Ben R. Mottelson

Published Oct 18, 1999• 86 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Quantum dots in magnetic fields are studied within the current spin-density-functional formalism avoiding any spatial symmetry restrictions of the solutions. We find that the maximum-density droplet reconstructs into states with broken internal symmetry: The Chamon-Wen edge coexists with a modulation of the charge density along the edge. The phase boundaries between the polarization transition, the maximum-density droplet, and its reconstruction are in agreement with recent experimental results.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.83.3270

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Quantum dots in magnetic fields are studied within the current spin-density-functional formalism avoiding any spatial symmetry restrictions of the solutions. We find that the maximum-density droplet reconstructs into states with broken internal symmetry: The Chamon-Wen edge coexists with a modulation of the charge density along the edge. The phase boundaries between the polarization transition, the maximum-density droplet, and its reconstruction are in agreement with recent experimental results.
The nature of the ground state of a few-electron system in a parabolic twodimensional (2D) quantum dot (QD) is theoretically investigated on the basis of a variational many-body approach within a second quantized formulation. The resulting analytical expressions lead to various phase transitions: maximum density droplet, Wigner phase, etc., in a broad range of magnetic fields. It is observed that in the case of relatively strong QD confinement and weak magnetic fields, a rotationally symmetric spin-singlet state is the ground state of the system. However, in a strong magnetic field and for the same QD confinement, a broken-symmetry spinsinglet state appears to be energetically favoured over the symmetric spin-singlet state. The method developed is generalized for the investigation of possible novel phases for electron-hole interacting systems.
Using a variational quantum Monte Carlo method, the effect of Landau-level mixing on the lowest-energy--state diagram of small quantum dots is studied in the magnetic-field range where the density of magnetic flux quanta just exceeds the density of electrons. An accurate analytical many-body wave function is constructed for various angular momentum and spin states in the lowest Landau level, and Landau-level mixing is then introduced using a Jastrow factor. The effect of higher Landau levels is shown to be significant; the transition lines are shifted considerably towards higher values of magnetic field and certain lowest-energy states vanish altogether.
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An efficient variational many-body wave function for electrons in a quantum dot is introduced. We show that the proposed bosonic two-body correlation factor is able to capture nearly exactly the missing correlations of the lowest-Landau-level many-body wave function. We compare the results with exact diagonalizations. The comparison shows that quantum Monte Carlo techniques combined with the proposed wave function are a powerful tool for studying quantum dots. As further evidence for this, we apply the scheme to a maximum density droplet state for up to 40 electrons.
Moiré superlattices can bind several electrons to each potential minimum, forming few-electron "moiré atoms." Using neural quantum states that obey magnetic periodic boundary conditions, include full Landau-level mixing, and treat both spin sectors, we map the ground state of two-electron moiré atoms in a superlattice as a function of moiré depth and magnetic field strength. At strong field each atom is a spin-triplet maximum-density droplet with canonical angular momentum ⟨Lz⟩=−1\langle L_z\rangle=-1⟨Lz​⟩=−1 and a persistent circulating current: the rotating counterpart of the "Wigner molecular crystal" recently imaged in moiré superlattices. Deepening the wells drives a singlet-triplet transition to non-rotating spin-singlet atoms whose only current is a weak diamagnetic counter-circulation. The transition moves to deeper wells as the field grows, so depth and field together open a window for the formation of rotors. This is the collective analog of the singlet-triplet transition of two-electron quantum dots. At the transition, the orbital magnetic moments of the atoms reverse sign as their spin polarization switches, a joint signature accessible to magnetometry. If the atoms are instead polarized by other means, such as magnetic proximity coupling, the rotors lock at weak field into a spontaneously ordered crystal of dimers in a pinwheel pattern.
Exchange energies and charge densities for few electrons in electrically tunable quantum dot (QD) systems are investigated by using the variational Monte Carlo (VMC) method in the presence of magnetic fields. For N = 2 electrons in double QD, the singlet Coulomb energy decreases in magnetic fields as a consequence of magnetic localization in both strongly and weakly coupled QDs. However, the triplet Coulomb energy reaches a maximum value at intermediate magnetic fields before decreasing. We observe good agreement between the results for VMC with s-p orbital trial wavefunction and exact diagonalization (ED) method in the exchange energies. For N = 2 electrons in triple quantum dot (TQD), we observe a discontinuity in the J-derivative with detuning voltage ( dJdVT ) in triangular TQDs at B = 0 T as crossing of the eigenenergy levels leads to abrupt spatial symmetry change of the triplet densities (density rotation) and relocalization. For B ≠ 0 T, the angular momentum provided to the electrons quenches this effect. The density rotation is absent in collinear TQD for all magnetic fields as the lowest excited state remains the px state and as such, no change in symmetry is possible. By varying the triangular TQD configuration, we show the discontinuity in ( dJdVT ) persists for top angle between 20° and 70°. For N = 3 electrons in symmetric triangular TQD, the monotonicity of the exchange curve from B = 0 to 4 T remains intact for decoupled QDs but not for coupled QDs. Finally, additional energy for the triangular TQD system is computed for up to N = 3 electrons.