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Positive and negative Coulomb drag in vertically integrated one-dimensional quantum wires

Nature Nanotechnology volume 6, pages 793–797 (2011)Cite this article

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Abstract

Electron interactions in and between wires become increasingly complex and important as circuits are scaled to nanometre sizes, or use reduced-dimensional conductors1 such as carbon nanotubes2,3,4,5,6, nanowires7,8,9,10 and gated high-mobility two-dimensional electron systems11,12,13. This is because the screening of the long-range Coulomb potential of individual carriers is weakened in these systems, which can lead to phenomena such as Coulomb drag, where a current in one wire induces a voltage in a second wire through Coulomb interactions alone. Previous experiments have demonstrated Coulomb electron drag in wires separated by a soft electrostatic barrier of width ≳80 nm (ref. 12), which was interpreted as resulting entirely from momentum transfer. Here, we measure both positive and negative drag between adjacent vertical quantum wires that are separated by ∼15 nm and have independent contacts, which allows their electron densities to be tuned independently. We map out the drag signal versus the number of electron sub-bands occupied in each wire, and interpret the results both in terms of momentum-transfer and charge-fluctuation induced transport models. For wires of significantly different sub-band occupancies, the positive drag effect can be as large as 25%.

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Figure 1: Schematics of the fabrication process of the vertically coupled quantum circuits.
Figure 2: Split gates design generating the double quantum wire structure.
Figure 3: Characterization of the non-ballistic quantum wires.
Figure 4: Drag resistance of the coupled quantum circuits.

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Acknowledgements

The authors acknowledge the outstanding technical assistance of D. Tibbetts and J. Hedberg. The authors also thank A. Clerk and T. Szkopek for inspiring discussions. This work has been supported by the Division of Materials Sciences and Engineering, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, US Department of Energy (DOE). This work was performed, in part, at the Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies, a US DOE, Office of Basic Energy Sciences user facility. Sandia National Laboratories is a multi-program laboratory managed and operated by Sandia Corporation, a wholly owned subsidiary of Lockheed Martin Corporation, for the US DOE's National Nuclear Security Administration (contract no. DE-AC04-94AL85000). The authors also acknowledge financial support from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), CIFAR, and from the FQRNT (Québec).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, McGill University, Montreal, H3A 2T8, Canada

    D. Laroche & G. Gervais

  2. Center for Integrated Nanotechnologies, Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, 87185, New Mexico, USA

    D. Laroche, M. P. Lilly & J. L. Reno

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  1. D. Laroche
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  2. G. Gervais
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  3. M. P. Lilly
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  4. J. L. Reno
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Contributions

M.P.L. designed and conceived the experiment. J.L.R. performed the growth of the double quantum well heterostructures. D.L. fabricated and characterized the samples, and performed the Coulomb drag measurements. G.G., M.P.L. and D.L. co-wrote the Letter and all authors discussed the results and commented on the manuscript.

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Correspondence to M. P. Lilly.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Laroche, D., Gervais, G., Lilly, M. et al. Positive and negative Coulomb drag in vertically integrated one-dimensional quantum wires. Nature Nanotech 6, 793–797 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2011.182

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