Asymmetric coherent photon tunneling filter in an optical waveguide structure

Based on the well-known electron coherent tunneling phenomenon, by simulation, a photonic tunneling filter fabricated in an optical waveguide is proposed. The Bragg grating structure is applied as the photonic barrier. Two photonic barriers confine a coherent resonance cavity or photon-quantum-well. We report an asymmetric-barrier structure with opposite phase. In this configuration, the central tunneling wavelength is exactly the same as the Bragg wavelength of the grating, independent of the photon-quantum-well dimension. The photon-quantum-well length can be adjusted to make the tunneling peak interval fall to a desired spacing. The photon barrier length is responsible for the filter bandwidth. As an application, an asymmetric grating photon tunneling filter with International Telecommunication Union grid is demonstrated.     

Tunneling-induced coherent electron population transfer in an asymmetric quantum well

We propose an asymmetric double quantum wells structure with a common continuum and investigate the effect of resonant tunneling on the control of coherent electron population transfer between the two quantum wells. By numerically solving the motion equations of element moments, the almost complete electron population transfer from the initial subband to the target subband could be realized due to the constructive interference via flexibly adjusting the structure parameters.     

Crystallization characteristics of a middle CoFeB layer in a double MgO barrier magnetic tunnel junction

The crystallization characteristics of a middle CoFeB free layer in a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) with double MgO barriers were investigated by tunneling magnetoresistance (TMR) measurements of patterned cells across an 8-inch wafer. The MTJ structure was designed to have two CoFeB free layers and one bottom pinned layer, separated by MgO tunnel barriers. The observed resistance showed three types of TMR curves depending on the crystallization of the middle CoFeB layer. From the analysis of TMR curves, coherent crystallization of the middle CoFeB layer with the top and bottom MgO barriers was found to occur non-uniformly: About 80% of the MTJ cells in the wafer exhibited coherent crystallization of the middle CoFeB layers with the bottom MgO tunnel barrier, while others had coherent crystallization with the top MgO tunnel barrier or both barriers. This non-uniform crystallization of the middle CoFeB layer in a double MTJ was also clearly observed in tunneling electron microscopy images. Thus, control of the crystallization of the middle CoFeB layer is important for optimizing the MTJ with double MgO barriers, and especially for the fabrication of double barrier MTJ on a large area substrate.     

Local electronic structure and Fano interference in tunneling into a Kondo hole system

Motivated by the recent success of local electron tunneling into heavy-fermion materials, we study the local electronic structure around a single Kondo hole in an Anderson lattice model and the Fano interference pattern relevant to STM experiments. Within the Gutzwiller method, we find that an intragap bound state exists in the heavy Fermi liquid regime. The energy position of the intragap bound state is dependent on the on-site potential scattering strength in the conduction and f-orbital channels. Within the same method, we derive a new dI/dV formulation, which includes explicitly the renormalization effect due to the f-electron correlation. It is found that the Fano interference gives asymmetric coherent peaks separated by the hybridization gap. The intragap peak structure has a lorenzian shape, and the corresponding dI/dV intensity depends on the energy location of the bound state.     

Coherent quantum transport in two-dimensional electron gas/superconductor double junctions with Rashba spin-orbit coupling

Based on the extended Blonder-Tinkham-Klapwijk (BTK) approach, we have investigated the coherent quantum transport in two-dimensional electron gas/superconductor (2DEG/SC) double tunneling junctions in the presence of the Rashba spin-orbit coupling (RSOC). It is found that all the reflection coefficients in BTK theory as well as conductance spectra oscillate with the external voltage and energy. The oscillation feature of conductance can be tuned largely by the RSOC for low insulating barriers, while for high insulating barriers it is almost independent of the RSOC. These phenomena are essentially different from those found in ferromagnet/superconductor double tunneling junctions.     

Mechanism of low-voltage field emission from nanocarbon materials

Field emission from nanostructured carbon materials is analyzed by applying the model of emission center in which the emitting surface contains two phases of carbon having substantially different electronic properties. In accordance with this model, the proposed mechanism involves electron tunneling through two potential barriers. The calculated probability of tunneling through two potential barriers implies that the low-voltage field emission observed experimentally can be attributed to the existence of resonant surface states. Numerical estimates suggest that the emission current can increase by at least four orders of magnitude owing to resonant tunneling through two potential barriers.     

A tunable terahertz-band oscillator based on a two-well nanostructure with a coherent electron subsystem

A theory of coherent resonance tunneling of electrons in a two-well nanostructure (TWNS) in the presence of a strong electromagnetic field is developed. The TWNS consists of two identical tunnel-coupled quantum wells to which a dc electric field is applied. Radiative transitions occur between two levels that arise due to the interwell interference and the dc electric field. The wavefunctions and polarization currents in the TWNS are found in the case of a strong electromagnetic field, and the oscillation power is determined as a function of the coherent pumping current and the parameters of the structure. It is shown that oscillations are possible in the relevant terahertz band, with fine frequency tuning by a dc field. It is found that the interference of electrons between quantum wells plays a crucial role. This interference significantly suppresses the effect of the electromagnetic field on the resonance tunneling and enhances the oscillation up to the highest possible level. It is proved that there exists an optimal regime of strong-field oscillations without inverse population and saturation, which are inherent in conventional lasers.     

Photon-assisted mesoscopic transport through a quantum dot–carbon nanotube system perturbed by microwave fields

We have investigated the coherent mesoscopic transport through the system with a quantum dot coupled to single-wall carbon nanotubes (CN–QD–CN) interfered by microwave fields (MWFs). The investigation focuses on the tunneling behaviors induced by the double coherent MWFs and the nature of CN leads. The incoherent fields induce the tunneling current possessing symmetric resonant behaviors. The coherent fields induce the asymmetric tunneling current resulting from the interference of tunneling current branches to form asymmetric photon-assisted net current. The quantum leads possess specific density of state (DOS) structure, and the matching–mismatching behavior takes important role in the mesoscopic transport. The feature of coupled MWFs and the connected quantum wires together control the characteristics of the mesoscopic system.     

Effects of structural disorders on sequential tunneling in multiple quantum wells

Based on an isotropic random distribution model, the effects of structural disorders embedded in the barriers on the sequential electron tunneling in multiple quantum wells were studied at low temperatures. By using a sequential tunneling model [Stievenard et al., Appl. Phys. Lett. 61 (1992) 1582], the transmission coefficient through a single barrier was calculated using a finite-difference method and averaged over random configurations of disorders. To compute the tunneling current, a self-consistent calculation for the electronic states was performed, including the Hartree and exchange interactions and non-parabolic energy dispersion. Both disorder-assisted and disorder-impeded electron tunneling phenomena were found as a function of the activation energy. The effects of electric field, barrier width, and temperature were also studied. The predicted resonant disorder-assisted electron tunneling should be large enough to be observable at low temperatures in an experiment.     

Quantum ratchets and quantum heat pumps

Quantum ratchets are Brownian motors in which the quantum dynamics of particles induces qualitatively new behavior. We review a series of experiments in which asymmetric semiconductor devices of sub-micron dimensions are used to study quantum ratchets for electrons. In rocked quantum-dot ratchets electron-wave interference is used to create a non-linear voltage response, leading to a ratchet effect. The direction of the net ratchet current in this type of device can be sensitively controlled by changing one of the following experimental variables: a small external magnetic field, the amplitude of the rocking force, or the Fermi energy. We also describe a tunneling ratchet in which the current direction depends on temperature. In our discussion of the tunneling ratchet we distinguish between three contributions to the non-linear current–voltage characteristics that lead to the ratchet effect: thermal excitation over energy barriers, tunneling through barriers, and wave reflection from barriers. Finally, we discuss the operation of adiabatically rocked tunneling ratchets as heat pumps. Received: 8 February 2002 / Accepted: 11 February 2002 / Published online: 22 April 2002     

Quantum Interference Effects for the Electronic Fluctuations in Quantum Dots

For the main quantum interference term of coherent electronic transport, we study the effect of temperature, perpendicular and/or parallel magnetic fields, spin-orbit coupling and tunneling rates in both metallic grains and mesoscopic heterostructures. We show that the Zeeman effects determines a crucial way to characterize the quantum interference phenomena of the noise for anisotropic systems (mesoscopic heterostructures), qualitatively distinct from those observed in isotropic structures (metallic grains).     

Instanton paths and coherent quantum tunneling in antiferromagnetic spin clusters subject to a strong magnetic field

The coherent quantum tunneling effects in antiferromagnets in the presence of a strong external magnetic field parallel to the easy axis have been investigated using the instanton formalism. In a wide field range including the region of the phase spin-flop transition, the tunneling is described by 180° instantons for which the Euclidean action is real and destructive interference is absent. At the transition point, 90° instantons describing the tunneling between the collinear and spin-flop states appear. The Euclidean action decreases, whereas the tunneling probability and tunneling level splitting in both phases increase significantly in the immediate vicinity of the spin-flop transition point. The possibility of observing the coherent tunneling effects for artificial small particles (magnetic dots) made of antiferromagnets is discussed.     

Scanning Tunneling Electron Transport into a Kondo Lattice

We theoretically present the results for a scanning tunneling transport between a metallic tip and a Kondo lattice.We calculate the density of states(DOS)and the tunneling current and differential conductance(DC)under different conduction-fermion band hybridization and temperature in the Kondo lattice.It is found that the hybridization strength and temperature give asymmetric coherent peaks in the DOS separated by the Fermi energy.The corresponding current and DC intensity depend on the temperature and quantum interference effect among the c-electron and f-electron states in the Kondo lattice.     

Resonant tunneling through electronic trapping states in thin MgO magnetic junctions

We report an inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy study on MgO magnetic junctions with thin barriers (0.85-1.35 nm). Inelastic electron tunneling spectroscopy reveals resonant electronic trapping within the barrier for voltages V>0.15 V. These trapping features are associated with defects in the barrier crystalline structure, as confirmed by high-resolution transmission electron microscopy. Such defects are responsible for resonant tunneling due to energy levels that are formed in the barrier. A model was applied to determine the average location and energy level of the traps, indicating that they are mostly located in the middle of the MgO barrier, in accordance with the high-resolution transmission electron microscopy data and trap-assisted tunneling conductance theory. Evidence of the influence of trapping on the voltage dependence of tunnel magnetoresistance is shown.     

Resonant tunneling of ultracold atoms through vacuum induced potentials

We demonstrate resonant tunneling of ultracold atoms through potentials produced by the interaction of atoms with the vacuum field of a system of cavities. We show the close connection of the transmission characteristics to the resonant states in vacuum induced potentials. Transmission of cold atoms, though sharing some features with tunneling in finite semiconductor superlattices, is strongly dependent on the coherent addition of amplitudes from various wells and barriers.     

Loss-enabled sub-poissonian light generation in a bimodal nanocavity

We propose an implementation of a source of strongly sub-poissonian light in a system consisting of a quantum dot coupled to both modes of a lossy bimodal optical cavity. When one mode of the cavity is resonantly driven with coherent light, the system will act as an efficient single photon filter, and the transmitted light will have a strongly sub-poissonian character. In addition to numerical simulations demonstrating this effect, we present a physical explanation of the underlying mechanism. In particular, we show that the effect results from an interference between the coherent light transmitted through the resonant cavity and the super-poissonian light generated by photon-induced tunneling. Peculiarly, this effect vanishes in the absence of the cavity loss.     

Magnetotransport in a graphene monolayer with two tunable magnetic barriers

The magnetotransport property for a monolayer graphene with two turnable magnetic barriers has been investigated by the transfer-matrix method. We show that the parameters of barrier height, width, and interval between two barriers affect the electron wave decaying length, which determine the conductance with parallel or antiparallel magnetization configuration, and consequently the tunneling magnetoresistance (TMR) for the system. Interestingly, a graphene attached by two barriers with different heights can produce a resonant TMR peak at low energy region one order of magnitude larger than that for the system with two same height barriers because that the asymmetry of magnetic barriers block the electron transmission in the case of antiparallel magnetization configuration. The results obtained here may be useful in understanding of electron tunneling in graphene and in designing of graphene-based nanodevices.     

分子电子器件简化模型的电子透射谱的计算

基于分子线耦合到电极的构成特点,采用简化的非对称多势垒连续隧穿模型模拟复合分子器件偏压下的电子隧穿过程,推导电子透射谱的解析表达式,同时计算垒宽、垒距、垒高、电子有效质量和所加偏压等参数与透射系数的关系,结果发现：当电子的能量为某些值时,出现明显的共振隧穿,且透射系数对这些参数的变化非常敏感,这表明可以通过适当的控制方式（如改变复合分子组成、构型等）来修改分子电子器件的输运性质. 关键词： 分子器件 非对称势垒模型 电子透射谱 共振隧穿     

Coupled quantum dots: manifestation of an artificial molecule

Transport spectroscopy reveals the microscopic features of few-electron quantum dots which justify the nameartificial atoms. New physics evolve when two quantum dots are coupled by a tunneling barrier. We study, both theoretically and experimentally, the tunneling spectroscopy on a double quantum dot. A detailed lineshape analysis of the conductance resonances proves that off-resonant coherent interdot tunneling governs transport through this system, while tunneling into the double quantum dot occurs resonantly. This coherent interdot tunneling witnesses the evolution of a delocalized electronic state which can be compared to a valence electron of thisartificial molecule.