Coulomb correlations and coherent charge tunneling in mesoscopic coupled rings

Abstract

We study the effect of a strong electron-electron (e-e) interaction in a system of two concentric one-dimensional rings with incommensurate areas A_1 and A_2, coupled by a tunnel amplitude. For noninteracting particles the magnetic moment (persistent current) m of the many-body ground state and first excited states is an irregular function of the external magnetic field. In contrast, we show that when strong e-e interactions are present the magnetic field dependence of m becomes periodic. In such a strongly correlated system disorder can only be caused by inter-ring charge fluctuations, controllable by a gate voltage. The oscillation period of m is proportional to 1/(A_1 + A_2) if fluctuations are suppressed. Coherent inter-ring tunneling doubles the period when charge fluctuations are allowed.

4 pages, 4 eps figures

References in corpus (3)

• Wigner Crystal in One Dimension
• Charge Transfer Induced Persistent Current and Capacitance Oscillations
• Aharonov-Bohm Oscillations in a One-Dimensional Wigner Crystal-Ring

Cited by in corpus (1)

• Influence of the Rashba effect on the Josephson current through a superconductor/Luttinger liquid/superconductor tunnel junction