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Sub-cycle optical phase control of nanotunnelling in the single-electron regime

Nature Photonics volume 10, pages 667–670 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

The high peak electric fields provided by single-cycle light pulses can be harnessed to manipulate and control charge motion in solid-state systems, resulting in electron emission out of metals and semiconductors1,2,3,4,5,6 or high harmonics generation in dielectrics7,8. These processes are of a non-perturbative character and require precise reproducibility of the electric-field profile9,10,11,12,13,14. Here, we vary the carrier-envelope phase of 6-fs-long near-infrared pulses with pJ-level energy to control electronic transport in a laterally confined nanoantenna with an 8 nm gap. Peak current densities of 50 MA cm–2 are achieved, corresponding to the transfer of individual electrons in a half-cycle period of 2 fs. The observed behaviours are made possible by the strong distortion of the effective tunnelling barrier due to the extreme electric fields that the nanostructure provides and sustains under sub-cycle optical biasing. Operating at room temperature and in a standard atmosphere, the performed experiments demonstrate a robust class of nanoelectronic switches gated by phase-locked optical transients of minute energy content.

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Figure 1: Carrier-envelope optical phase control of tunnelling currents in a nanodevice.
Figure 2: Characterization of phase-locked optical control transients.
Figure 3: Stationary characterization of the nanocircuit.
Figure 4: Carrier-envelope optical control of sub-cycle tunnelling in the nanoantenna.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge support from Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft through collaborative research centre SFB 767 and the Emmy Noether programme, from the European Research Council (Advanced Grant no. 290876), the Eliteprogramm of Baden-Württemberg Stiftung and the European Commission via the Marie Curie Carrier Integration Grant.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics and Center for Applied Photonics, University of Konstanz, Konstanz, D-78457, Germany

    Tobias Rybka, Markus Ludwig, Michael F. Schmalz, Vanessa Knittel, Daniele Brida & Alfred Leitenstorfer

Authors
  1. Tobias Rybka
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  2. Markus Ludwig
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  3. Michael F. Schmalz
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  4. Vanessa Knittel
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  5. Daniele Brida
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  6. Alfred Leitenstorfer
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Contributions

A.L. and D.B. conceived the ideas and supervised the work. T.R., M.L. and M.F.S. built the laser system and fabricated the nanocircuits. V.K. numerically modelled the nanoantennas. T.R. and M.L. performed the tunnelling measurements. T.R., D.B. and A.L. wrote the manuscript. All authors contributed to the scientific discussions.

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Correspondence to Daniele Brida or Alfred Leitenstorfer.

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Rybka, T., Ludwig, M., Schmalz, M. et al. Sub-cycle optical phase control of nanotunnelling in the single-electron regime. Nature Photon 10, 667–670 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2016.174

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