Unexpected behavior in a two-path electron interferometer

We report the observation of an unpredictable behavior of a simple, two-path, electron interferometer. Utilizing an electronic analog of the well-known optical Mach-Zehnder interferometer, with current carrying edge channels in the quantum Hall effect regime, we measured high contrast Aharonov-Bohm...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inPhysical review letters Vol. 96; no. 1; p. 016804
Main Authors Neder, I, Heiblum, M, Levinson, Y, Mahalu, D, Umansky, V
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published United States 13.01.2006
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Summary:We report the observation of an unpredictable behavior of a simple, two-path, electron interferometer. Utilizing an electronic analog of the well-known optical Mach-Zehnder interferometer, with current carrying edge channels in the quantum Hall effect regime, we measured high contrast Aharonov-Bohm (AB) oscillations. Surprisingly, the amplitude of the oscillations varied with energy in a lobe fashion, namely, with distinct maxima and zeros (namely, no AB oscillations) in between. Moreover, the phase of the AB oscillations was constant throughout each lobe period but slipped abruptly by pi at each zero. The periodicity of the lobes defines a new energy scale, which may be a general characteristic of quantum coherence of interfering electrons.
ISSN:0031-9007
DOI:10.1103/physrevlett.96.016804