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A. H. MacDonald

Publications and source records attributed to A. H. MacDonald.

At least 325 records · Page 18Linked to original sources
arXiv1995

Skyrmions without Sigma Models in Quantum Hall Ferromagnets

We report on a microscopic theory of the Skyrmion states which occur in the quantum Hall regime. The theory is based on the identification of Skyrmion states in this system with zero-energy eigenstates of a hard-core model Hamiltonian. We find that for $N_ϕ$ orbital states in a Landau level, a set of Skyrmions states with orbital degeneracy $N_ϕ-K$ and spin quantum number $S = N/2 -K$ exists for each nonnegative integer $K$. The energetic ordering of states with different $K$ depends on the interaction potential.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1995

Drag in paired electron-hole layers

We investigate transresistance effects in electron-hole double layer systems with an excitonic condensate. Our theory is based on the use of a minimum dissipation premise to fix the current carried by the condensate. We find that the drag resistance jumps discontinuously at the condensation temperature and diverges as the temperature approaches zero.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1995

Thermodynamics of Quantum Hall Ferromagnets

The two-dimensional interacting electron gas at Landau level filling factor $ν=1$ and temperature $T=0$ is a strong ferromagnet; all spins are completely aligned by arbitrarily weak Zeeman coupling. We report on a theoretical study of its thermodynamic properties using a many-body perturbation theory approach and concentrating on the recently measured temperature dependence of the spin magnetization. We discuss the interplay of collective and single-particle aspects of the physics and the opportunities for progress in our understanding of itinerant electron ferromagnetism presented by quantum Hall ferromagnets.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1995

Spin-ordering and magnon collective modes for two-dimensional electron lattices in strong magnetic fields

We study the spin-ordering and the magnon collective modes of the two-dimensional Wigner crystal state at strong magnetic fields. Our work is based on the Hartree-Fock approximation for the ground state and the time-dependent Hartree-Fock approximation for the collective modes. We find that the ground state is ferromagnetic, i.e that all spins are aligned at T=0 even when the electronic g-factor is negligibly small. The magnon calculations show that the spin-stiffness is much smaller in the crystal state than in fluid states which occur at nearby Landau level filling factors.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1995

Skyrme Crystal In A Two-Dimensional Electron Gas

The ground state of a two-dimensional electron gas at Landau level filling factors near $ν=1$ is a Skyrme crystal with long range order in the positions and orientations of the topologically and electrically charged elementary excitations of the $ν=1$ ferromagnetic ground state. The lowest energy Skyrme crystal is a square lattice with opposing postures for topological excitations on opposite sublattices. The filling factor dependence of the electron spin-polarization, calculated for the square lattice Skyrme crystal, is in excellent agreement with recent experiments.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1995

Mixed-State Quasiparticle Spectrum for d-wave Superconductors

Controversy concerning the pairing symmetry of high-$T_c$ materials has motivated an interest in those measurable properties of superconductors for which qualitative differences exist between the s-wave and d-wave cases. We report on a comparison between the microscopic electronic properties of d-wave and s-wave superconductors in the mixed state. Our study is based on self-consistent numerical solutions of the mean-field Bogoliubov-de Gennes equations for phenomenological BCS models which have s-wave and d-wave condensates in the absence of a magnetic field. We discuss differences between the s-wave and the d-wave local density-of-states, both near and away from vortex cores. Experimental implications for both scanning-tunneling-microscopy measurements and specific heat measurements are discussed.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1995

Multi-Component Quantum Hall Systems: The Sum of their Parts and More

The physics of the fractional quantum Hall effect is the physics of interacting electrons confined to a macroscopically degenerate Landau level. In this Chapter we discuss the theory of the quantum Hall effect in systems where the electrons have degrees of freedom in addition to the two-dimensional orbital degree of freedom. We will be primarily interested in the situation where a finite number of states, most-commonly two, are available for each orbital state within a degenerate Landau level and will refer to these systems as multi-component systems. Physical realizations of the additional degree of freedom include the electron spin, the valley index in multi-valley semiconductors, and the layer index in multiple-quantum-well systems. The consideration of multi-component systems expands the taxonomy of incompressible states and fractionally charged excitations, and for example, leads to the appearance of fractions with even denominators. More interestingly, it also leads us to new physics, including novel spontaneously broken symmetries and in some cases, finite temperature phase transitions. We present an introduction to this rich subject.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1995

Interactions, Localization, and the Integer Quantum Hall Effect

We report on numerical studies of the influence of Coulomb interactions on localization of electronic wavefunctions in a strong magnetic field. Interactions are treated in the Hartree-Fock approximation. Localization properties are studied both by evaluating participation ratios of Hartree-Fock eigenfunctions and by studying the boundary-condition dependence of Hartree-Fock eigenvalues. We find that localization properties are independent of interactions. Typical energy level spacings near the Fermi level and the sensitivity of those energy levels to boundary condition show similar large enhancements so that the Thouless numbers of the Hartree-Fock eigenvalues are similar to those of non-interacting electrons.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1994

Collective Modes of Soliton-Lattice States in Double-Quantum-Well Systems

In strong perpendicular magnetic fields double-quantum-well systems can sometimes occur in unusual broken symmetry states which have interwell phase coherence in the absence of interwell hopping. When hopping is present in such systems and the magnetic field is tilted away from the normal to the quantum well planes, a related soliton-lattice state can occur which has kinks in the dependence of the relative phase between electrons in opposite layers on the coordinate perpendicular to the in-plane component of the magnetic field. In this article we evaluate the collective modes of this soliton-lattice state in the generalized random-phase aproximation. We find that, in addition to the Goldstone modes associated with the broken translational symmetry of the soliton-lattice state, higher energy collective modes occur which are closely related to the Goldstone modes present in the spontaneously phase-coherent state. We study the evolution of these collective modes as a function of the strength of the in-plane magnetic field and comment on the possibility of using the in-plane field to generate a finite wave probe of the spontaneously phase-coherent state.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1994

Participation-Ratio Entropy and Critical Fluctuations in the Thermodynamics of Pancake Vortices

We report on a study of the thermodynamics of the Ginzburg-Landau model for two-dimensional type-II superconductors near the transition from the normal state to the Abrikosov-lattice state. We couch our analysis in terms of the participation-ratio entropy, $s(P)$, which expresses the volume in order-parameter-space with a given participation-ratio for the local superfluid density. $s(P)$ completely determines the thermodynamics of the system. We report on results for $s(P)$ obtained analytically using perturbation expansion methods and numerically using Monte Carlo simulation methods and discuss the weak first-order phase transition which occurs in this system in terms of the properties of $s(P)$.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1994

Introduction to the Physics of the Quantum Hall Regime

These lecture notes attempt to explain the main ideas of the theory of the quantum Hall effect. The emphasis is on the localization and interaction physics in the extreme quantum limit which gives rise to the quantum Hall effect. The interaction physics in the extreme quantum limit which is responsible for the fractional quantum Hall effect is discussed at length and from an elementary point of view.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1994

Magnetic Oscillations and Quasiparticle Band Structure in the Mixed State of Type-II Superconductors

We consider magnetic oscillations due to Landau quantization in the mixed state of type-II superconductors. Our work is based on a previously developed formalism which allows the mean-field gap equations of the Abrikosov state to be conveniently solved in a Landau level representation. We find that the quasiparticle band structure changes qualitatively when the pairing self-energy becomes comparable to the Landau level separation. For small pairing self- energies, Landau level mixing due to the superconducting order is weak and magnetic oscillations survive in the superconducting state although they are damped. We find that the width of the quasiparticle Landau levels in this regime varies approximately as $Δ_0 n_μ^{-1/4}$ where $Δ_0$ is proportional to the magnitude of the order parameter and $n_μ$ is the Landau level index at the Fermi energy. For larger pairing self-energies, the lowest energy quasiparticle bands occur in pairs which are nearly equally spaced from each other and evolve with weakening magnetic field toward the bound states of an isolated vortex core. These bands have a weak magnetic field dependence and magnetic oscillations vanish rapidly in this regime. We discuss recent observations of the de Haas-van Alphen effect in the mixed state of several type II superconductors in light of our results.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1994

Spontaneous Inter-layer Coherence in Double-Layer Quantum-Hall Systems I: Charged Vortices and Kosterlitz-Thouless Phase Transitions

At strong magnetic fields double-layer two-dimensional-electron-gas systems can form an unusual broken symmetry state with spontaneous inter-layer phase coherence. In this paper we explore the rich variety of quantum and finite-temperature phase transitions associated with this broken symmetry. We describe the system using a pseudospin language in which the layer degree-of-freedom is mapped to a fictional spin 1/2 degree-of-freedom. With this mapping the spontaneous symmetry breaking is equivalent to that of a spin 1/2 easy-plane ferromagnet. In this language spin-textures can carry a charge. In particular, vortices carry e/2 electrical charge and vortex-antivortex pairs can be neutral or carry charge e. We derive an effective low-energy action and use it to discuss the charged and collective neutral excitations of the system. We have obtained the parameters of the Landau-Ginzburg functional from first-principles estimates and from finite-size exact diagonalization studies. We use these results to estimate the dependence of the critical temperature for the Kosterlitz-Thouless phase transition on layer separation.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1994

On the Thermodynamics of Laughlin Liquid Freezing

The competition between liquid and solid states of strongly correlated electron systems occurs in a novel way in a strong magnetic field. The fact that certain Landau level filling factors are especially favorable for the formation of strongly correlated liquid states, gives rise to the fractional quantum Hall effect. In this article we discuss some consequences of the existence of incompressible states with fractionally charged quasiparticle excitations for the thermodynamics of the liquid-solid transition.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1994

Collective excitations in double-layer quantum Hall systems

We study the collective excitation spectra of double-layer quantum-Hall systems using the single mode approximation. The double-layer in-phase density excitations are similar to those of a single-layer system. For out-of-phase density excitations, however, both inter-Landau-level and intra-Landau-level double-layer modes have finite dipole oscillator strengths. The oscillator strengths at long wavelengths for the latter transitions are shifted upward by interactions by identical amounts proportional to the interlayer Coulomb coupling. The intra-Landau-level out-of-phase mode has a gap when the ground state is incompressible except in the presence of spontaneous inter-layer coherence. We compare our results with predictions based on the Chern-Simons-Landau-Ginzburg theory for double-layer quantum Hall systems.

cond-mat↗
arXiv1993

Correlations in Two-Dimensional Vortex Liquids

We report on a high temperature perturbation expansion study of the superfluid-density spatial correlation function of a Ginzburg-Landau-model superconducting film in a magnetic field. We have derived a closed form which expresses the contribution to the correlation function from each graph of the perturbation theory in terms of the number of Euler paths around appropriate subgraphs. We have enumerated all graphs appearing out to 10-th order in the expansion and have evaluated their contributions to the correlation function. Low temperature correlation functions, obtained using Padé approximants, are in good agreement with Monte Carlo simulation results and show that the vortex-liquid becomes strongly correlated at temperatures well above the vortex solidification temperature.

cond-mat↗