Single-electron pump with highly controllable plateaus

Pumping one electron at a time to improve quantum devices

27 April 2022

A highly controllable source of single electrons will provide quantum physicists with more control over their experiments.

Future quantum-based devices, such as quantum computers, will require highly controllable sources of electrical current that can dispense electrons one at a time on demand — so-called single-electron pumps.

Now, a researcher from the University of Cape Town and an international team have designed a single-electron pump based on gallium arsenide, which offers more control in experiments.

Their single-electron pump exhibited excellent stability. In particular, a parameter known as the quantized plateau was both long — hundreds of times longer than those of conventional single-electron pumps — and flat, ensuring stable and accurate operation. The team achieved this by redesigning the gate of their single-electron pump.

The researchers also note that the ability to tune various parameters independently should lead to a better understanding of exactly how such single-electron pumps work.

Supported content

References

1. Applied Physics Letters 119, 153102 (2021). doi: 10.1063/5.0067428