Imaging magnetic focusing of coherent electron waves

By K. Aidala, R. Parrott, Tobias Kramer, Eric J. Heller, R. Westervelt, M. Hanson, Arthur C. Gossard. 2007

135 citations recorded by the source corpus.

The magnetic focusing of electrons has proven its utility in fundamental studies of electron transport. Here we report the direct imaging of magnetic focusing of electron waves, specifically in a two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG). We see the semicircular trajectories of electrons as they bounce along a boundary in the 2DEG, as well as fringes showing the coherent nature of the electron waves. Imaging flow in open systems is made possible by a cooled scanning probe microscope. Remarkable agreement between experiment and theory demonstrates our ability to see these trajectories and to use this system as an interferometer. We image branched electron flow as well as the interference of electron waves. This technique can visualize the motion of electron waves between two points in an open system, providing a straightforward way to study systems that may be useful for quantum information processing and spintronics.

Subfields: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics, Condensed Matter Physics

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/0dead70ec93c1792a421cf8e4e2f69df4fd47651

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In Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics

In Condensed Matter Physics

Citations in the corpus

Electrically tunable transverse magnetic focusing in graphene (2013, background): “We also note that density fluctuations and small-angle scattering [14] due to impurities could also affect the carrier’s path and its focus.”