Contemporary Physics, 1992, volume 33, number 1, pages 1[1-127

Physics in less than three dimensions

L. J. CHALLIS

An. introduction is given 10 the methods ofproduction and the properties %ne-, tl,i'Oand three-dimensional electron gases. In two dimensions this includes the formation of electron solids .( Wiqner crystallization) and the quantum Hall effects and in one-dimension, the quantization of ballistic transport. The article ends witha short discussion of the applications of low-dimensional structures In electroni and optoelectroni ' systems,

1. Introduction

Planes, lines and poin ts, all 'objects.' of Jess than three dimensions" are very familiar mathematical concepts. However, at first sight, the idea that approximations to these ooncepts might exist naturally, or be made artificially, seems physically absurd. The physical world is made from three-dimensional objects, so how, for example, could one construct a plane-an object of zero thickness-from atoms -0.1 nm across, or even electrons e- LO-22 III across? Quantum mechanics seems to make it even harder. If we take the plane to be z = 0, then the uncertainty principle sets a severe limit f1/Apz on the distance ~z within which an electron, say, can be confined by electric fields. The uncertainty in the a-component of the momentum tlp", must cl.early be large if the 'plane' is to be thin. But since the electron i equally likely to be travelling in the + and - z directions, i1p, ~ 2p. and cannot be 'large' or the electron will escape from the potential well in which it is trapped.

So the man-made low-dimensional structures of less than three dimensions that are very actively being studied at present are not low-dimensional in a strictly geometrical sense. Indeed, the so-called 'two-dimensional electron ga e " or 2DEGs are contained within plates whose thickness is typically between I to 10 nm-tens of atomic diameters across. The reason why they are called 2DEGs is that ance the thickness of the plate becomes appreciably less th311 some critical value, which depends on temperature and a few other parameters, most of the interesting physical properties become virtually independent of thickness. The electron

Alilho/' 's address: Physics Department, University or Nottingham, Nottingham, NG9 2RD, England

gas has effectively reached the a ymptotic limit of a 2D system.

This interesting behaviour i the consequence of what is known as spatial quantization, The forces that confine an electron gas into, say, a plate of thickness a can conveniently be described by a potential whose form can often be roughly approximated to that in figure I-this is the potential well already referred to above. A simplifying approximation is to allow the potential to rise from zero inside the well La infinity outside so that the electron wavefunction drops to zero at z = 0 and {I, Examples of wavefuncticns for all' electron inside such a well are shown in figure 2. Their wavelengths are evidently given by

nA.

-=G

2 '

where It = 1,2,3,... so the possible de Broglie

o

o

II

~I

o

---+ -: z

(a)

(b)

Figure 1. Potential wells (V =0 for 0 < z < tI). (II) a finite well, V = Va for z < 0, z > a, (h) an intinite well, V = for z < 0, z > a.

112

11=3

ljI(z)

1l=2

___ , __ L 1 ,_

o

a

z

Figure 2. Wavefunctions in an infinite potential well.

momenta of the electrons are

where h is Planck's constant, and their kinetic energies, which are shown schematically in figure 3 (a), are

p: 112hz

E =_. =-,-

$ 2m 8ma2'

Throughout we write In = m*, the effective mass, of the electron which in a solid can be appreciably Jess than mo--the free electron mass. These kinetic energies Et

11=3

9£"
E<
4£"
s.
0
(a) 11=1

L. J. Challis

correspond to the motion of the electron across the plate. The motion in the xy plane of the plate remains essentially tbat of an electron in a bulk sample for which

p2 e.; =-,

2m

but p is now the in-plane component of the momentum and this is shown in figure 3 (b). So the total energy of an electron is

n2hl p2

E=--+-

8ma2 2m

and has the form shown In figure 4, Each parabolic set of energies is called a sub-band and it can be seen that the sub-bands overlap in energy. It can also be seen that E~ is equal to the minimum energy that an electron can have in the nth sub-band-the energy it has when it has no kinetic energy due to motion in the plane.

The number of electrons per unit area of a 2DEG is called the sheet density n. and at absolute zero, these will all occupy the lowest energy levels allowed by the Pauli exclusion principle (two electrons in each level allowing for spin), So if the plate contains. only a modest number of electrons, 11$ rn,-2 these will all be in the n = 1 sub-band. The energy of the highest filled level is called the Fermi energy Er where EF = (h2/41tm)n •. So for n. = lO1:S m"? and for GaAs, Where In = O'07mo" EF = 4 meV measured from the bottom of the sub-band. Now since the energy of the bottom of the n = 2 sub-band measured . from the same point is £2 - E, = 3h2/8ma~ = 190meV for (J = to nrn, EF lies far below E2.' Interestingly the condition for this

Fri. 3h2

--' ~~-,

41t1n 8ma?

can be written as the plate thickness a ~ the average separation of the electrons, d = (nn.r 1/2.

This situation, which is illustrated in figure 4, though not to scale, describes what happens at absolute zero.

o

Figure 3. The-possible energies of II particle in II thin plate, (a) E, = .rz2EO' where Eo = hl/8mal:, and (b) E" = p2/2in.

p

(b)

Physics in less than three dimensions

113

E

o

p

Figure 4. The total energy of a particle in a thin plate:

E·= E= + E"J' = 112 Eo + pZ /2m.

However even at room temperature, rather few electrons are excited to the next sub-band since kaT ~ 26 meV is small compared with the excitation energy ·tlE = £2 - EF = 186 mev. At liquid helium temperatures Z4K, where much of the research on these systems is done, the number is completely negligible.

To a very good approximation then, provided kB T <.{ tlE raising or lowering the temperature by a small amount can only change the in-plane kinetic energy. So the electronic contributions to thermodynamic properties such as specific heat, thermal conductivity and thermopower are all essentially two dimensional. This is a[5'0 the case for the transport properties such as resistance rnagnetoresistance and Hall voltage provided the additional energies associated with applied electric and magnetic fields are also small ( <.{ tlE}.

2. Production ofa two-dimensional electron gas

A two-dimensional electron gas can be made, as in figure 5 by sandwiching a thin layer, (~10 nm) of a semiconductor such as GaAs between thicker layers of a semiconductor with a larger energy gap than that of GaAs. The usual choice is (AlGa)As-an alloy of AlAs and Ga As, The energy levels of GaAs and AlO'33Ga067As, a typical alloy composition, are shown schematically in figure 6 together with the energy levels in the region of the sandwich. The relative positions of the two gap centres are fixed by the condition that the chemica] potential should be the same in both materials.

(AIGa)As

GaA

(AIGa)As

figure 5. An (AIGa)As/GaAs/(AIGa)As sandwich.

It can be seen that the steps in energy at the GaAs/(AIGa)As interfaces give rise to potential wells and so discrete energy levels in both the conduction and valence bands. A 20 electron gas can now be formed if one of the (AJGa)As layers is doped with Si donors as shown. The significant property of a donor atom is that one of its electrons is very weakly bound so that even at quite low temperatures, it has a. good chance of escaping into the conduction band. Once it has, it can. find its way to the potential well where it becomes

Condu tion ~~~~ii~

/" bands ,~

~ "'" T

Energy gap

G~As

(AIGa)As (IJ)

(a)

Conduction band

/~

D0n~ bd-Eleclrons

Discrete / (2DEG)

electron .

states

Discrete ~I I

hole

Valence

hand

Slates

(AIGa)As G,IAs (AIG~~)As

z

(c)

Figure 6. The ene.rgy levels of (a) GaAs, (b) Alo.nGao'6,As and (c) (AIGa)As/GaAs/(AIGa)As sandwich (schematic). Tbe sandwich has been modulation doped. to form 3 20EG by placing a layer of donors at a. dlstance from the well.

114

L. J. Challis

trapped with others to form a 2DEG. The first 'electrons probably go directly into the well by travelling acros the (AJGa)As layer but the later ones are repelled by those already there so they probably get into the well by diffusing sideways until they reach a contact where they can enter more easily .. The dopant impurities are usually placed some distance from the well so that they produce very little scattering of the carriers. This is called modulation doping.

A further property that make (AIGa)As attractive for the outer layers of the sandwich is that its cry tal structure is the same and its lattice constant is almost identical to that of GaAs-the materials are 'latticematched '. So there is very little strain at the interface and if the layers are carefully formed, the interfaces can be made very nearly perfect. This feature, pins the weakness or the impurity scattering. resulting (rom modulation doping, means that at low temperatures the electrons can have very high mobilities (100-1000 m2 V-1 s- i). and so quite long mean free paths ( ...... lO-JOO um).

Two-dimensional electron gases also form next to a single interface between GaAs and (AIGa)As or between either similar combinations. An example of such a system which is called a heterostructure is illustrated schematically infig\l.re 7. Another common two-dimensional system is a Si MOSFET, where the electron gas is formed just below the surface of a Si sample. The Si surface is coated with an oxide layer and a metal gate evaporated onto the top of the oxide. A 20EG is formed when a

E_

(A1Ga),As

Figure 7. A two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG) in an (AIGa)As/GaAs heterostructure (schematic). The electrons in the 2DEG come from donors in the (AIGa)As.

positive voltage VG is applied to the gate since this attracts electrons to the top surface of tbe SI. As their sheet density n. IX VG, n can readily be varied over a wide range. A 2DEG can also be formed just above the surface of Liquid helium. An electron near the helium polarises the helium atoms and the attraction between the 'electron and the atomic dipoles it has produced in the helium causes it to be attracted towards the surface. The sheet density can be increased by applying a positive voltage to a plate under the helium surface. And one can also form, just beneath the helium surface, a 2D gas of helium ions of tnasslOO 000 times greater than that or electrons in GaA . So 20 systems can be made with a very wide range of physical properties.

3. Tunnel barriers and saperlattices

Similar techniques to those used to form potential wells can also be used to form tunnel barriers, figure 8. These are barriers which, according to classical mechanics, would be totally impenetrable to electrons. However in the correct description of their behaviour which is by quantum mechanics, the electrons have a small probability of tunnelling right through the barrier. The tunnelling rate is very small so a tunnel barrier acts as a large resistance which can be put in series with other components. The resistance increases with barrier width and height and a range of values can be obtained by suitable choice of thickness and. ill some cases material composition which determines the height. A number of interesting structures can now be made using these two basic units of potential well and tunnel barrier. One example is the re onant tunnelling device shown in figure 9 in which a quantum well is separated by tunnel barriers from two highly doped regions. Because of energy conservation, an electron on the left hand side of the device can only tunnel through the barrier into the well if its energy equals that of one of the discrete energy

GaA.~

(AIG~)As

GaAs

z

Figure 8. A tunnel barrier formed frOID layers of GaAs, (AIGa)As and GaAs.

115
, f
GaA' a
* c
(AIG~)As /J :l
i
GaAs
(AIGa)A. Physics in tess than three dimensions

(AIGa)As

(AIG<I)A~

EI-~


1/ /
Discrete level,

GaAs (Emillur)

GaAs (Collector]

Figure 9. A resonant tunnelling deviee Conned from layers of GaAs and (AIGa)As. The outer two layers are heavily doped with donors.

levels inside the well. Once inside however the electron can tunnel very readily into a level of the same energy on the right hand side of the barrier. If a voltage V is applied across the device, the level on the left band side are raised relative to those inside the well. So, as V is varied, sharp resonant peaks occur in the tunnel current I when an electron on the left hand side bas just the right energy to enter the well. The fall in current with increasing voltage (dT (d V < 0) that occurs just above one of these peaks, means that the differential resistance dV (dl is also negative. So when this device is combined with a: resonant circuit those impedance falls to a minimum at a frequency vo, the current breaks into spontaneous oscillations at "o- The upper frequency limit of oscillators of this type is set by the time it takes for the electron to cross the well and although other constraints may mean this limit is never achieved it should soon be possible to make oscillators and detectors of frequency up to 1000 Gl-lz=-Iar higher than that of any other solid-state device. Resonant tunnelling devices are also the source of a great deal of interesting physics. For example, if the two barriers have different widths their J(V) characteristics show hysteresis behaviour which has been widely studied as has the effect of applying magnetic fields which bend the path of the electron as it passes through the device.

This structure can be repeated many times as shown in figure 10 and the result is called a superlattice and can be thought of as a set of weakly coupled identical resonant tunnelling devices. In general, if two identical resonators are. weakly coupled, the single resonance or one of them is replaced by two resonant peaks at frequencies on each side of the original. Similarly if /1. are coupled there are n peaks and if these are closely spaced, they form a re onant band of frequencies with 11 ripples on the top. In a superlattice, this resonant band is called a mini-band and if a voltage is put across the superlattice, an electron will travel easily through it if its energy lies anywherewithin oe of the mini-bands. However, it will

GaAs

(AIGil)As

GaAs

Figure 10. (AIGa)As.

A superlattice of alrernate layers of GaAs and

be slopped if its energy lies in a minigap between two mini-bands, Another way of thinking about this is by analogy with the Bragg scattering that occurs when a wave, like an X-ray or an electron, passes through a periodic structure such as an atomic lattice. The scattering peak trongly for wave-numbers k= .IITC/(' where n is an integer, c is the lattice spacing and k = 2n/wavelepgth, In the superlattice c = a + b (figure 10) and k = nn/c determines the centre of the mini-gap. This behaviour is of course merely an extension of that of the much smaller periodicity of the atomic lattice which gives rise to the much bigger energy bands and gaps of the bulk material.

4. Two-dimensional gases, liquids and solids

A two-dimensional electron gas is certainly not an ideal gas' indeed it often behaves more like a liquid than a 'gas, In an ideal 2D gas there are of course no forces between the particles so that if we distribute them randomly inside a circle the statistical fluctuations that occur in their distribution lead to clusters where a few particles are very dose together and to 'Voids where there are very few at all. This is a situation characteristic of the distribution in a gas at an instant in time and an example is shown in figure 11 (a). In figure l I (b) we see the effect of switching on Coulomb repulsion between the particles. The distribution is now much more even because the particles all try and keep as far away from each other as possible a.nd. the clusters and voids have almost disappeared. There is no apparent long-range order or pattern in the distribution however as there is in a crystalline solid and i.11 fact this is a distribution similar to that in a liquid. Figure 11 (c) shows what happens in the limit where the repulsion is so strong that it dominates the distribution of the particles. The need, energetically. to be as far as possible from each other

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forces the particles into a hexagonal 2D lattice-ea solid. So, tIS the forces increase, the system changes from a gas to a liquid to asolid.But what determines the magnitude of the force at which these various changes occur? If there were no disordering forces opposing the Coulomb forces which are dearly trying to establish order one would expect that even the smallest Coulomb repulsion would produce a solid, But there are 'disordering forces' which are the result of the kinetic energy of the particles, In some systems; this can be made small by lowering the temperature but in a gas of particles such as electrons which obey the Pauli exclusion principle the kinetic energy remains non-zero and of value ~ Ep (the Fermi energy) even at absolute zero .. If the system is a solid, it will melt when this kinetic energy becomes large compared with the potential energy associated with the Coulomb forces and, as it becomes even larger, the liquid turns into a gas. So whether a system isa solid, a. liquid or a gas is determined by the ratio of the potential to the kinetic energy and this is caned the plasma parameter r. The value of I' at which solidification (melting) occurs is denoted T m and can now be calculated quite accurately for a 2DEG in both the so-called classical regime when kll T};> Ep and the quantum mechanical regime when Er- };>. ks T.

Electron solids are often referred to as Wigner solids after the theoretical physicist Eugene Wigner who considered the conditions necessary for their formation in a paper published in 1934. They were not in fact observed until 1979 when Grimes. and Adams first saw the solidification of a 20EG above liquid helium and this work confirmed both the form of the melting curve and determined the value I' <11 = 131 ± 7 in the classical regime. It is interesting that it is much easier to See Wigner solidification in a 20 system than in a 30 system where in fact it has still not been seen. Essentially this is because in 3D, at the low temperatures needed for sotidification, the electrons become trapped by positive charges=donor impurities=whereas in 20 it is possible to keep most of the donors away from the 2DEG.

Since EF cc n. the classical regime Ep 4;. kp,T is easiest to achieve when ns is small, as it is for electrons over helium (n, - l09m-Z-1013 11'1-2). The potential energy

2

e . 1/2

V~--=Cfr .

41Uol" s,

e2 where C =--, 41tfo

so, consequently in the classical regime r = Cn~11/kB T,

Figure 11. The elfect of increasiQg Coulomb repulsiof! (In tlJe distribution ofa 2.0 system ofcparged particles: (a) zero or weak repulsion-s-gas, (lI) modest repulsion-liquid, (LI) strong repulsion=eolid •. «a) 3!l1d (lI) are taken [rom Laughlin's article in 'The quantum H;JU effect", see Bibliography.)

Physics in less than three dimensions

117

and melting occurs when ko T= Cn:Jl;r E' Hence the melting curve has the form It;' = C'T2 shown in the lower part of 'figure 12 (C' = (f mkn/C)2).

At the higher sheet densities, n. >" 1014 m-2, and lower effective masses of electrons in 2DEGs in semiconductors, EF .:b ksY and is also comparable with the 'repulsive potential energy between the electrons. So in most semiconductors including Ga As the electron system will remain liquid even at the lowest temperatures. Since Ep increases more rapidly with 11. than does V· (EF OC ii" V oc n~/l) unusually solidification would result from expanding the Jiquid-reducing 11, below 1014 m - 2-though this is not yet possible technically. In Si, however, where EF is six times smaller than in GaA for the same value of n , experiments suggest that solid form in high mobility samples when n.. ~ 1014 m-2 (Kravchenko et al. 1991) though more work is needed to confirm this. In GaAs there has been considerable activity to produce solidification by applying very large magnetic fields ~ 15 T or more perpendicular to the 2DEG. The field forces the electrons to move in 'cyclotron orbits' ~ 5 nrn or so across and because the electrons are now more confined than in zero field they are much easier to solidify. So the effect of a magnetic field increases the value of the sheet density at which solidification should occur at low temperatures and a

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Figure 12. The melting curve n;n(T) of a two-dimensional electron snlid shown in reduced units (after Dahm and Vinen (J.987». At high densities and low temperatures, E" ~ kfj T and Il~ is i.ndcpendent of T(n:' a: TO),.Ai' 16W densities, E" ~ kn r and

~oc~ .

number of transport and optical experiments have recently been carried out on 2DEGs in GaAs which suggest that solidification does indeed occur in very high fields and very low temperatures.

5. The quantum Han effects

The integer quantum Hall effect was first seen in Si ill 1980 and the significance of the effect led to the award of the Nobel prize to Klaus von Klitzing in 1985. To understand it we mustfirst consider what happens to the electrons in a 2DEG when a strong magnetic field is applied perpendicular to the plane. If we apply classical mechanics we find that the path of an electron of peed v is bent into a circle of radius r given by Newton's law: mass x acceleration (v2/r) = Lorentz force (Bep) or

mv2 -=Bev. r

So the angular frequency 4) = 1:1/)' = Belm = 28 GHz per tesla for m =111'0 and this is usually called the cyclotron frequency We'

A quantum mechanical treatment of this problem shows that the lowest possible energy of the system is !t1Wc. So equating t.his to !rn.vz, gives a value for the lowest speed of v = (l1wc/m)I/.2 and the smallest radius of r = vlw OT

c

r =(__!,__) 1(2 = (__Il_.) 1/2

B = BJ/2 urn,

. mer)c ·e

26

which is called the magnetic length lB' In this improper but helpful mixture of classical and quantum mechanical treatments, r = fa is the radius of a circular 'cyclotron orbit' and has a value -10 nm in a field of 10 T. A similar result to this can be obtained in a full quantum mechanical treatment although now the circular cyclotron orbits become Fuzzy in an analogous way to those of the circular Bohr orbits for a hydrogen atom. Quantum mechanics also shows that the continuous band of energy levels available to electron in zero magnetic field becomes magnetically quantized into highly degenerate levels calJed Landau levels, figure 13. The energies of these leves are

En = (It + ~)f7.w(>

and each contains Be/It separate wavefunctions per m2 of sample. SOl allowing for spin, each Landau level can contain up t.o 2Be/h electrons m -2.

In real samples, there is always disorder due to the imperfections and impurities present and these give rise to variations jn the electrostatic potential energy at different parts of the crystal. We can think of these rather

118

E

1--------11+2

£

I-----.-r----II+'I f~wo !---------L1- 1'1

Density of states ((I)

(b)Dcnsity of states

like the variation in height and so gravitational potential energy, shown in a contour map. There are mountains and valleys corresponding to electrostatic energy maxima and minima. Some of the minima are deep and narrow enough to act as potential wells in which there are discrete energy levels called localized states. In fact, electrons can only be localized in these states if there are no extended (delocalized) states of the same energy in the valleys around them. If there are, the electrons are no longer localized because they can escape by tunnelling through the barriers separating them from the valleys. So in magnetic fields, localized states can only exist if they have energies corresponding to the gaps between the Landau levels where there ar.e no extended states. The disorder also changes the energy of the extended states in a Landau level. As we shall see below, each state is located in a slightly different part of the sample so the change in energy due to disorder will in gene ral be different for each of them. So the effect of disorder .is to broaden out the sharp Landau levels into bands of extended levels separated by bands of localized states as shown in .figure 13 and the 2Be/n states m"? per Landau level are now shared between the localized and extended levels. At absolute zero, the electrons fill up all the lowest energy levels in the sample to, the Fermi energy Ep which could either lie inside a Landau band OT within the localized states in the 'gap' between two Landau bands.

As we have seen, one way of treating the effect of applied magnetic fields leads to fuzzy circular cyclotron orbits, in which the electrons are confined to a region ~ In across (somewhat larger if they are not in their lowest energy levels), Another, which is equally valid but mathematically much easier to deal with. confines the

L. 1. Challis

E

Figure 13. The energy levels (Landau levels) of electrons in a 2.0 EG in a perpendicular magnetic field (a) B = 0, (h) B# 0, ideal system, E. = (11 + lj2)Flw", (c) B * 0, disordered system showing the broadening or the Landau levels and the localized levels in the gaps between the bands of extended states.

Density ofstates (c)

electrons in one direction only with the motion normal to this being totally unaffected. To illustrate this we consider the wavefunotions of a free electron in a large two-dimensional box of size L, x Ly- In zero magnetic field, If; = sin (ktx) sin (k"y) where k.<Lx = 2arr and /(~L)T = 2bn to make ifl the same at opposite edges of the box (a. and b are integers and these <Ire called periodic boundary conditions). In a held B, if we arrange the magnetic confinement to be in the x direction only the wavefunctions become If; = <P(x - xo) sin (kyY). So there is no change in the y direction but sin (k",x) has become a bell-shaped function (a simple harmonic oscillator function) di{x - xo) centred at x = Xo which confines the electron to within <!'/IJ of Xo where Xo = -/~k),. For each possible value of k" (2bn/Ly where b = 1, 2 3 ... ). the wavefunction is a narrow strip of width IB and length L. and the strips are separated by llifl,k~, = 2'1[1~/Ly. A sketch of these wavefurrctions=-Landau strips-is shown in figure 14. Since there are L"Ly/2nn strips in a sample width L; there arel/2n/~ = Bejh. strips per unit area Ior

! r
J I I ,
e
L

8,~
1



y F.igure 14. Eleerronic wavefunctions in a magnetic. field-Landau strips (highly- schematic: for L; = 1 mm and B = ID TIthe centres of neighbouring strips are separated by 4 x 10 -1:101).

Physics in less than three dimensions

.119

each Landau level. So when spin is included we obtain the re sult given earlier that each level can hold up to 2Be/h electrons rn - 2.

These strips behave rather like railway lines. An electron can travel From one side of the sample to the other in the y direction and back again but ·cannot change lines. In practice in samples of reasonable size the strip widths are much greater than their separation (Ill $> 2nlULy because L, ~. 2nln)' So the strips are heavily overlapping and, if an electron can acquire the necessary momentum, it can also make a sideways move.

In concluding this description or the wavefunctions of 2D electron gases in magnetic fields, we emphasise that the physically more appealing circular or symmetric wavefunctions and the mathematically more appealing linear or asymmetric wavefunctions both lead to exactly the same energy. The reason we can. represent the wavefunctions in such very different ways arises from the fact that there is a very large number of them with exactly the same energy. This number, 2Bejh m-2 equals 5 x 10.15 m - 2 in a field of 10 T and each of the circular wavefunctions can be formed by taking suitable linear combinations of the S. xl 015 m -2 linear wavefunctions,

The quantization of the electronic energy levels into Landau levels gives ri e to the very intriguing field dependence of the electrical resistivity and the Hall voltage of the sample which is illustrated in figure 15.

.14.000 2
rz.ooo
3
IO,Il()O ~
8000
6(]<)0
4UllO
2000
0
300
200
1.0(.) 2

6

4

Brr

), igure 15. The resists nee R = V / I and the Hall resistance ;:; Vid I of a 2()EG in GaAs in a strong magnetic field (paalanen et al. (982).

T'he resistivity changes very rapidly from values which in typical samples vary from about a hundred to several thousand ohms down to values for B = n. h/2ne (/1 = 1 2,3, ... ) which are immeasurably small at the lowest temperatures .. These very small values only occur if the current is less than some critical value and at first sight this might suggest that the 2DEG bas become some sort of a superconductor. The material is not superconducting however and if its temperature is raised,its resistance increase steadily unlike that of a superconductor which remains zero until the temperature reaches a critical value when it suddenly jumps. Further very interesting behaviour is seen in the Hall voltage I!;-!. This 'is the voltage measured across the width of the 'ample in a perpendicular magnetic field when a current I flows along its length. It is convenient to define a Hall resistance RH = VHf] and in 3D samples V~I and RH both increase linearly with magnetic field. However in 2DEGs, there are flat plateaux which occur at the fields at which there are zeros in the' ordinary' resistance measured between two ide contacts along the 2DEG (figure l5). At the same time the resistance between the source and drain contacts becomes equal to Rl:J becau e even though the bulk resistivity is zero the electrons have to cross the width of the sample on their passage through it.

The appearance of these plateaux is interesting ill itself but the reason for thinking that it reflects something very fundamental is that the value. of RII at the plateaux are exactly the same in, all materials and all samples to enormous precision. The most precise measurement of this so far shows that for 2DEGs in GaAs and in Si the Hall resistances at the arne plateau are equal to better than a few part in 1010! (Hartland et al. 1991). This is a remarkable result since the amount of disorder present in GaAs samples is very different from that in Si samples-this is suggested by their mobilities which typically differ bya factor of 100 or so. So although there is exactly the same number of electronspresent in each sample, 2nBe/h m-1, when they are on the same plateau, many more of them will be localized in Si so the number in extended slates win be substantially fewer than in GaAs. The significance of thi is that in the analysis that works well in 3D, R(i only depends on the number of electrons that can carry current, that is the number that are in extended states. So how can we get exactly the same value of RH for two samples in which this number differs substantially? We have to conclude that there is some sort of requirement at work which forces the electrons 1n extended states in one of the samples to move faster than we should expect by exactly the right amount to make up for those that are stationary!

The HaU resistance in a 2DEG is then a universal and very surprising property which is. dearly intimately

120

linked with quantum behaviour since the resistance values are equal to hllle2, where n is an integer, to within the precision that h/e2is known. One practical application arising from this precision is t.hat in 1990, the quantum Hall resistance replaced the groups of manganin-wire coils used as the standards of resistance (Hartland 1988). The magnitude of the ohm is now obtained from the quantum Hall resistance at the nth plateau RJ[ = Rdn where RK, the von Klitzing.constant, is taken to be 25 812·807 times the SI ohm.

There have been many attempts to explain this behaviour and, although substantial understanding has been achieved, it is not yet complete. The zeros in resistance occur when the Fermi levellies within the gap between the Landau levels so, since we are at very low temperatures (kn T ~ hwJ, virtually all the Landau levels. below EF are filled and all those above are empty. At first sight, then, it is difficult to see how any current can flow. Clearly there can be none from levels above EF since there are no electrons present in these levels. And by analogy with a 3D semiconductor at low temperatures one might expect that the electrons in the filled Landau bands below EF could not conduct since there are no empty states for electrons to move into. So why isn't the resistance infinite rather than zero'? Tt turns out that all the electrons in extended states can move together with a velocity v proportional to Er.j, the Hall electric field (VttlLJ and in the absence of disorder, v = EH/B. So a current can flow and the reason why the resistance is zero is that the eJectrons cannot be scattered. They cannot move into any other states because these are all filled.

A very appealing argument to explain why the Hall resistance should be quantized when the resistance is zero was made by Laughlin in 1981 and extended by Halperin a year later. It uses the idea of electron confinement into Landau strips or 'railway lines' that was outlined earlier but with a different geometry from the rectangular sample we have described so Jar. The arrangement considered by Halperin is shown in figure 16 and is called a Corbino disc, The disc has the form of a washer, contact is made to the 2DEGali the way round the outer and inner circumferences and a voltage V is applied between them. So in zero magnetic field, current flows radially between them. In a magnetic field and in the quantum Hall regime, R = 0 so since V = I R there can be no voltage in the direction of the current and therefore no current can flow radially between the contacts. A current does flow however and 'in fact it flows around the sample rather than across and has a value 1= VIR'i or VFI/RJi since it is driven by an electric field perpendicular to the current

So what is happening at a microscopic level? The electrons can only flow along their railway lines so the

L. .I. Challis

e

B

v

Figure 16. A two-dimensional sample in the form ofa Corbino disc ..

railway lines must be circular and look very much like Bohr orbits. Indeed the same quantization oondition applies as in Bohr theory which is that the length of the orbit 211:"r must equal an exact number of de Broglie wavelengths A = hlp: 2n:r = j). where j is an integer. Or, in terms of the de Broglie wave-number k = 2rr.)J..j the change in phase .. ~ k: dl of the wavefunction in going round the orbit must equal = j2n.

Since magnetic fields are present, the momentum p that determines ). and k is not just the product of the mass and velocity but also iuvolves the field (Mp = Inti + eA where A is the magnetic vector potential defined by curl A = 8). So the value of k of a circulating electron can be decreased by increasing the flux inside its orbit (decreased because e is negative). If we do this by keeping the field on the 2DEG fixed and only changing it inside the hole in the middle of the disc, the flux inside each orbit changes by the same amount and so the phase change of the wavefunction round each orbit increases by the same amount too. If nO.W we choose this flux change to be hie', which is the amount needed to make the phase in all the orbits change by. 2rc the arrangement of circulating electrons after the change Looks exactly the same as it. was initially. The electrons circulate at exactly the same radii as tbey did before the flux was changed. So at first sight nothing has happened. But ill fact, as we increased the flux, each circle expanded=-e was decreased so I' had to increase to keep the phase integral constant-and we increased it to the point where each electron moved from its original circle to the next one out. The overall effect therefore was a transfer of one electron from the inner contact to the outer and, since the potential difference between them is 1-';., work was done of eJtH. But changing the field also

Physics in less than three dimensions

121

produces an electric field tangential to the railway lines because of Faraday's law and this does work I x flux change = Illle. So equating these two expression gives Ih/e =eVH or

h

RH=2> e

which becomes RJ.] = h/ne2 jf there are 11 filled Landau levels rather than the one considered here.

So it can be seen that the quantization of the Hall resistance can be attributed to a very fundamental aspect of quantum mechanics, and this, of course, would still apply even if a hole were drilled through part of the disc so that the 'railway lines were no longer circular but had to ourve round the hole. It should be admitted though that. Laughlin's model has its critics. Indeed there have been many other theoretical treatments and there is for example, still considerable debate and experimental effort to discover how much of the current is carried across the width of the 2DEG and how much is carried by states- very near the edges of the sample, One of the recent experiments carried out in Nottingham to study this examines the change in resistance when a fine beam of phonons (very high [requency sound) is wept across the sample (Kent et al. 1992).

A few years after the discovery of the integer quantum Hall it was found that in very pure samples, additional structure, minima in R. and plateauxin RH, occurred at B = rlsh/2ne when n was ;;l fraction 1/3, 2/3, 2/5 3/5 etc. corresponding to a Landau level that was 1/3 filled etc-e-we refer to the fraction as the filling factor. This

tructure is called the fractional quantum Hall effect and to understand it we need to include the Coulomb repulsion between the electrons. This complicates the picture because we can no longer represent the wavefunctions in terms of Landau strips. But we can get a feeling for what is happening if for the moment we assume we can. Suppose a Landau level is 1/3 filled. Because of the repulsion between them, the electron occupy every third Landau strip across the sample in order to keep as far away from their neighbours as possible. If however one more electron i added 10 one of the empty strips, the repulsive energy it feels is appreciably more because [1 bas to be closer to its neighbours than is the case for all the other electrons. So there is a jump in energy-an energy gap-between the 1/3 filled state and the states above it. This energy gap is also present when a more careful if disorder is included there will be localized state within the gap. So if the Fermi energy EF lies in the gap, the sample resistance falls to zero at the lowest temperatures as in the integer ca e. In the Corbino geometry we can again think of giant 'Bohr. orbits' and the Laughlin

argument leads to the value of Rr-r of the Hall plateau that is obtained experimentally. The size of the energy gap can be measured from the increase in R as the temperature i raised.

A particularly intriguing feature is that the electron in this situation appear to share themselves over all the Landau strips. So each strip appears to contain a charged particle, "a quasi-particle', of charge e* = e(3 and in many respects, these seem to move about and behave remarkably like real particles. Indeed if we increase the number of electrons beyond the 1/3 filling factor itappears as if it is DOW these fractionally charged e/3, quasi-particles that arrange themselves to minimise the repulsion between them rather than the singly charged electrons. The next energetically favourable situation occurs when every fifth strip has an extra quasi-particle, that is when there are 6/5 quasi-particles of charge e/3 which corresponds to a filling factor of 6/5 x J/3 = 2/5. 'The indication that this is happening is that there is a resistance minimum and a Hall plateau at this value again suggesting the presence of an energy gap. At this point the electrons appear to have rearranged themselves into quasi-particles of charge e/5 and if their number is increased these in turn have an energy minimum at a particular filling factor and so on and so on. So there is a whole hierarchy' of fractionally charged quasiparticles and these lead. to a very ricb spectrum of resistance minima and Hall plateaux.

The fractional occupations are remarkably favourable energetically, An impression of just hOWn111Ch the energy falls when the exact fraction is reached comes from several experiments on 2DEGs in GaAs at very low temperatures and in magnetic fields just strong 'enough to solidify the 2D electron system. Increasing the field, produces stronger confinement of the electrons and tips the energy balance even further in favour of the solid. However when the field reaches the value at which the occupation of the lowest Landau level has dropped to exactly 1/5th, the solid melts! The potential energy of the liquid in this fractional quantum Hall state is evidently less than. that of the solid so the system lowers its energy by melting. If now the field is increased by a small amount, the potential energy of the liquid ri es rapidly becoming greater than that of the solid and the system freezes again. So the Iiquid state exists for just a .small region of field around the ]/5tb filling factor. This intriguing feature in the phase diagram may also be repeated at filling factors of 1/7th 1/9th and possibly even beyond but as yet there is no clear experimental evidence for this.

'Theoretical research On the fractional quantum Hall effect is also a fascinating and very active area. A particularly interesting question i are these fractionally charged quasi-particles bosons or fermions? We recall

122

that all particles or tightly bound aggregates of particles discovered so far either obey Bose-Einstein statistics (bosons) or Fermi-Dirac statistics (fermions). The difference between them lies in the behaviour of the combined wavefunction of two identical particles. Since they are identical nothing physically detectable like the magnitude of the wavefunction can occur if their positions are exchanged. It is however quite possible for the wavefunction to change by a phase factor exp (i4») since that does not change its magnitude. For bosons <p = 0 so the wavefunction is unchanged when the particles are exchanged but for fermions ¢ = 1t so the sign of the wavefunction is reversed. However when two fractionally charged quasi-particles of a 20EG are exchanged ¢ is neither 0 nor nand the wavefunction changes by a complex phase-factor. So the quasi-particles are neither bosons nor fermions and the name anyons bas been coined to describe their very unusual statistical. behaviour (e.g., Aitchison and Mavromatos (1991) Wi.lczek (1991».

6. One dimensional electron gases--quaotum wires

A one-dimensional electron gas or quantum wire can be produced by evaporating two metal strips on top of the sample as shownschematically in figure 17. If we put a negative voltage on to the gates, the electrons move away from the strips directly under the gates to the regions between them and, if the potential is made large enough the sheet density falls to zero under the gates. So now the 2DEG breaks up into essentially independent strips and we can consider the behaviour of one of them-a quantum wire.

The potential confining the electrons in the y direction perpendicular to the wi.re can reasonably be approximated to by a harmonic potential V = -!mco~'l so the Schrodinger equation for motion across the strip gives rise to energy levels of a simple harmonic oscillator E" = (110 + W1COo. The motion in the x direction is unaffected by this electrostatic confinement in the y direction so its energy remains equal to Ex = fi2kel2m and the total energies are shown in figure 18. At very low sheet densities, all the electrons are in their ground state for motion in the y direction and at low temperatures the system can be thought of as a one-dimensional electron gas in an analogous way to the way we think of a two-dimensional system. More typically, however, several channels will be occupied as shown in the figure but, if the temperature is Low, transition between 1 D sub-bands are very improbable and we can treat the electrons as existing in N essentially independent 10 sub-bands.

If the length of the lD channel is appreoiablyless than the electron mean free path the electrons travel along it

L. J. Challis

Electrons repelled from under gates (depletion)

2 deg

Figure 17. The formation ofa 1 D system using a gated 2DEG.

without scattering-ballistically-and this gives rise to very interesting transport properties as can be seen using a simple model. We suppose that the 20EG at one end of the channel in figure 17 is earthed and that the potential of the 2DEG at the other end is reduced by a small voltage V So the energies of all the electrons at that end are raised by eY. If for simplicity we DOW assume that all the potential drop occurs at this end, then those electrons with energies in the range EF to EF + eV which have velocities towards rather than away from the channel can enter empty state,'; in the channel and pass right through it without being scattered. (Evidently electrons of lower energy cannot enter because the states are already filled), So jf there are 6n such states per unit length and the electrons in those states have velocities ~VF' the current flowing along the channel is

I = 6.nevpo

We must nOW relate .1n to Y. To do this we first note that the Fermi velocity Vii" is given by !mvf = EF so that

Physics in less than threedimensions

123

E

N channels occupied

t

k;

Figure 18. The energy levels of a to system. The position of the Fermi energy EF in this example is such that N levels are eccupied,

if the velocity corresponding to EF + eV is !)F + zluF eV = tm(vF + AUI'll - tmvf-

Now the number of states .1.11 including spin, per unit length per ID sub-band, In a velocity range [iF to VI' + AVF is

2mllvF An = _._-

h. '

2eV so An =-hVF'

If N sub-bands are occupied 2e2NV i=-h '

giving a channel resistance

h

R.=-,-,

2e-N

and a channel conductance

2e2N G=-h '

with the striking feature that they are totally independent of the length of the channel!

The first experiments demonstrating this were made independently in 1988 by B. J. van Wees and his colleages at Delft University and Philips laboratories and by D. A. Wharam and his colleagues in Cambridge. An example of some of their results is given in figure 19 where the conductance G is shown plotted against the gate voltage VG- which determines the width of the quantum wires. At low values of VG' the wires are wide and the ID sub-bands are closely spaced so that Nand hence G is large. But as Va increa es, the wires become narrower and the separation of the sub-bands gets bigger. So N falls in integer steps as the sub-bands move one by one through the Fermi energy Er: and the corresponding drops .in G are clearly seen, a is the fact that G is quantized in units of 2e2/h.

It is interesting and probably very significant that the resistance h/e2 N of a quantum wire is exactly the same as the quantized Hall resistance of a 2DEG and so the resistance between the source and drain contacts at the same field as discussed earlier. Indeed one very convincing interpretation of the quantized Hall resistance essentially treats the CUTTent carrying' railway lines' at the edges of the sample as quantum wires connecting the two contacts (Biittiker 1988).

One-dimensional ballistic resistors, have the unusual property that i.f two are connected in series, the value of the total resistance is not equal to the sum of the two but the larger of the twol The system behaves as if the smaller resistance is not present. This property follows from the fact that each resistance is independent of its length. So it is not changed if an additional length of ballistic resistor is added provided that this new length has a resistance equal to or less than the original. This

10
r
s 8
..
~
.... 6
<.J
'c:
'"
t
" 4
.",
c:
a
U
2
0
-2 -1.8 -1.6 -1.4 -1.2 -1 Gate voltage ~

Figure 19. The conductance G of a JD system in units of 2e2/h as a function of the gate voltage VG showing plateau x at 2Ne2/1! (N = l , 2 ... .), As VGbecomes less negative, the quantum wire becomes wider so that the 10 levels become closer and N increases (van Wees et al. 1988; similar result, .. were obtained independently by Wharam et al. 1988).

124
I
B I A

I I
1 deg L. J. Challis
I
I c

I I
1 deg
2 deg (a) 2 deg 2 deg

Figure 20. Two quantum wires connected in series by a region of 20~G.

is illustrated in figure 20 for two equal JD ballistic resistors RnA' RAe. The connection is made by a region of 2DEG, A, and this has to be short enough that an electron can pass through the combined structure without being scattered.

. h

then R/Jc = -2-as well. 2e N

However if electrons are scattered on average at least once in A, the two resistors act independently and

h h II

RBc = -_ + -_ = -,-. 2e1 N 2e2N e~ N

An. elegant test of these results was made by my Nottingham colleagues (Main et al. 1989) using the arrangement in figure 21 (the small gated structures were made in Glasgow by electron beam lithography). The 1D channels are the regions between the gates so if we mea ure the resistance between Band C, we must find RaG = R,UI + RAe since the only way electrons can normally pass from B to C is if they are scattered in A as in figure 21 (0). If, however, a magnetic field is applied of just the right strength to bend the path of ballistic electrons from B to C as shown in figure 21 (b) most current can now. flow ballistically and we expect Rnc = RAB = RAe' The results are shown in figure 22. Figure 22 (a) shows the result at a low magnetic field and confirms that RBt1 = Rnc + RAe to high precision while figure 22 (b) shows that at a larger field Rnc ~ RAil ~. Rile·

The structure of two parallel gates can also be extended to the arrangement shown in figure 23. If a relatively weak potential is applied to the gates a periodic modulation in the potential energy is produced-a lateral superlattice, A number of transport studies have been made of structures of this type and they show interesting quantum oscillations in magnetic fields with

A

B

(bl

0.5 fLl11

Figure 21. A.n arrangement of three gates used to create two lD channels. (a) zero magnetic field: electrons can only travel between the 20 regions Band C as a. result ofimpurity scattering in A; (b) magnetic field present: electrons travel along curved paths to get from B to C (after Main et al. (J989».

turning values when the size of the electron orbit in the field is matched to the superlattice spacing.

7. Zero-dimensional systems=-quantam dots

The split-gate structure in figure 17 can be further extended using other gates or a single ring to confine the electrons into a small area of the 2DEG and therefore a small volume of space-a quantum box. The energy levels in the box are wholly discrete so we can think of the box as an artificial atom and consider it to be zerodimensional in a similar way we considered 2D and 1 D systems. Zero-dimensional structures are usually referred to as quantum dots and arrays of quantum dots, as well as quantum wires can be made by a number of other techniques including etching and controlled precipitation. One attraction they have to physicists is that they only contain a small number of electrons which can be

Physics in. tess than three dimensions

125

20

10

OL_ __ ~ __ ~ ~ __ _L L- __ _L __ ~

-2.0

-1.S

-1.6 ViVOI[

-1.4

20

(0)

10

oL- __ _L ~ __ _L L_ __ _L ~ __ ~

-Z.O

-1.8

-1.4

-1.6 VglVoll

Figure 22. The resistances RBA and R.4C of the individual quantum wires and the resistance RBC of the series combination. The resistances are shown as a, function of VG and show plateaux at values of Ii/Ne2, (a) B = 0·1 T: R.BA ~ RAe and Ryc ~ 2RBA, 2R,K' (6) .B = 1·5 T: RSA ~ RAe ~ RJ)c (Main et al.1989).

varied by making samples from 2DEGs of differing heet densities. So they provide an excellent laboratory to study experimentally how electron-electron repulsion affects various properties and to- compare these results with calculations which should be much more tractable and capable of computer simulation than those for samples containing much larger numbers of electrons. In some cases precursors of phenomena like the fractional quantum Hall effect are predicted to occur and studies of these should provide very good insight into the phy ics that is occurring in a large area 2DEG sample.

Quantum dots have been investigated in transport experiments by for example coupling them to region of 2DEG by one-dimensional channels. Very pronounced transmission maxima are seen when the Fermi energy of the 2DEG is in resonance with a discrete state of the quantum dot and the structure provides a lowerdimensional analogue to the resonant tunnelling device

_1<

2 deg

From above

Metal gales

~

Vo < 0

Figure 23.. A set of parallel gates used to form a lateral superlattice.

discussed earlier. There has also been very widespread interest in their optical properties, not least in their potential for lasers which will be discussed briefly below.

8. Applications

It seems inevitable that the novelty and variety of physics that is found in low-dimensional physics will transfer to widespread application in solid-state devices. Major industrial. investment has been made and some products are already in use. One is the high electron mobility transistor or HEMT in which the use of a 2DEG leads to low noise performance at frequencies well above that of other devices, The HEMT wa first demonstrated in 1980 and millions are now produced every month. Their major use at present is in the first stage of satellite receivers where their performance has greatly reduced the transmission power needed and so the costs of satellite broadcasting. This is an example of a fairly conventional device made very much more effective by introducing low-dimensional features or technology and there are likely to be many others, A lot of development work is also being done on more novel devices such as resonant tunnelling oscillators and detectors and on more sophisticated systems in which electrical contact can be made to layers at various depths from the surface-so-called buried layers. It is generally thought though that tbe most widespread applications of low-dimensional structures will be in optoelectronics, for example in light-emitting diodes and lasers, for a whole

126

range of uses such as fibre-optic communication, optical storage such as compact di es-c-the majority of CD players already use quantum well lasers-and in visual displays including television. Extremely small lasers have recently been made which are less than a micron across (Jewell et al. 1991) and are referred to as microlasers. At present they are restricted to. infrared emission but when they are extended to. the visible they could have enormous potential in visual displays and could also find use in other fields such as microsurgery where a very small laser could be inserted wellinside a patient's body.

Tn the low-dimensional or quantum well laser whi.ch was first demonstrated in 1979, electrons are electrically injected into. the lowest discrete state of a thin layer of a semiconductor .and fall down into. t.he lowest energy hole-stale of the same layer and if this structure forms part: of a cavity wit;h reflecting mirrors it can be made to lase in the usual way .. Quantum well lasers ~LVe more efficient because the electrons and holes are nearer to each ather on average. They are also bluer, that is of higher frequency, than conventional lasers made from the same material because the electrons and holes are in discrete levels which are further apart in energy than they are in the bulk material. The extra energy increases as the well gets thinner so the frequency ofthe light emitted can be tuned by adjusting the thickness of the layer. This can be an advantage in optical communication since the transparency of anoptical fibre varies with wavelength .. Interestingly the most efficient quantum well lasers are made from layers which are poorly lattice-matched so that the active layers are quite heavily strained. The improvement ill efficiency occurs because of changes produced by the strain in the energy level positions of the holes. Law-dimensional structures can also. be used as optical waveguides and interconnects which CRn take the light from one part of a chip to another. The goal is to have materials and structures in which electronics and optoelectronics can be carried aut on the same chip.

The interesting properties of quantum wires and dots should provide many further possibilities for application. Perhaps the most evident arises from the increase that should occur in laser efficiency with decrea ing dimensionality because the electrons and holes are now even nearer to each other than they are in quantum wells and their energies are more closely bunched together, Quantum wire lasers were first demonstrated in 1990 and although quantum dots now seem less likely to find application as lasers they could well be very effective in other devices such as infrared detectors. A very good introductory review to the wide range of potential uses of low-dimensional structures in both electroni.cs and optoelectronics is given in the book by Weisbuch and Vinter. Modern technology also. makes very great use of magnetic torage and here too it seems very Likely that

L. J. Challis

the thin multilayer magnetic systems which are being very actively studied in many re earch laboratorie will find major application in the next few years.

9. Conclusions

Research on physics in less than threedimensions could be said to have started about 25 years ago when the electron gas in. a Si MOSFET was rust shown to. have two-dimensional properties (Fowler et al. 1966). But it was nat until layers grown by molecular beam epitaxy became widely available about ten years or so ago that the subject really began 1.0 take off. The parallel technologies of optical and electron beam lithography have also. been of very great importance allowing the formation of surface structures of resolutions down to ~ 1 urn and 50 or even 20 nm respectively. The next revolution, presently underway, arises from the recent discovery that individual atoms can be moved around .urfaces by the probe of a scanning tunnelling microscope and lines have now been written which correspond to a single row f atoms. The hope and expectation is that this will lead to the formation of structures an order of magnitude smaller than those presently available.

The study of their law-dimensional properties now completely dominates semiconductor physics. It seems too soon to say whether this will also. develop to the same extent in other areas of solid state physics but certainly the technology is already permeating into metal physics, magnetism and superconductivity a~d very exciting result are appearing showing the effects of restricting interactions to. two-dimensions.

So physics in less than three dimensions may soon be seen, if it is not already, to be a very presumptious title for an article confined to a discussion of th.e properties of non-interacting and interacting electrons .. These are arguably the simplest low-dimensional systems one can possibly envisage and if suoh a simple system can produce such a rich spectrum of new properties and ideas, including fractional charges and the po sibility that they arc anyons obeying fractional statistics one might surely expect further surprises to. emerge from studies of low-dimen 10naI systems involving even mare complex farms of interaction. We might hope that there tao the reduction in dimensions will remove some of the averaging effects that occur in three dimensions to reveal even more dramatic effects of quantum physics.

Acknowledgments

I am extremely grateful to. all my colleagues ill the Nottingham 'NUMBERS project on low-dimensional structures with whom I have bad countlessstimulating discussions and to the Science and Engineering Research

Physics in less than three dimensions

Council, the Royal Society and the EEC for financial support. I should particularly like to thank Professor C. T. Foxon, Dr P. C. Main and Dr P. A. Maksym for their very helpful comments on the manuscript.

BibHogrllpfty

urther discussion can be found in "the following reviews and papers ..

General

Ando, T.. Fowler, A. B. and Stem, F .. 1982, Re», ,Iolfod. Phys., 54, 437.

Ii' wier, A. B .. Fang. F. P., Howard, H. E. and Stiles, P. J., 1966. "hys.

Re». Lett .. 16, 1901. (The first demonstration of 2D behaviour in a semiconducting structure.)

[992, Surf. Sci., 263. This issu.e forms "the Proceedings of the Ninth International Conference on Electronic Properties 01" TwoDimensional Systems. Nara, September 1991.

Wcisbuch. C .. and Vinter, B., 1991, Q!.IW1[Wn. Semiconductor Structures (Sun Diego: Academic. Pre 5). (This is it very good introduction to the whole, ubject.)

Resonant tunnelling

Toombs. G. A., and Sheard, F. W., Electronic Properties (If" Mll/liJay£<rs and Low- Dimensional Semiconductor Structures edited by 1. M. Chamberlain et al. (New York: Plenum Pres ). p. 257.

Wigllcr crystallization

Dahrn, A. J., and Vinen, W, r .. 1987. Physics Today. 40,19 .

Grimes, C. c, and Adams, G., 1979. Pliys. Rei'. Le.u.A2, 795. (The first observation of Wigner crystallizauon.]

Khurana" A., 1990. Pliysu» Today, 43,17.

Kravchenko, S. \1" Pudalov, \I, M., Carnpbell.J. and D'Ioria, M., 1991.

J£:rl:' Lett .. 54. 528,

MacDonald, A,. and Girvin, ,,199D, Pliysics World, 3; 17. Wigner, E., [934, Pliys. ReI,'" 46. 1004.

The quantum Hall effects

Aitchison. 1. J, R., and Mavromatos, N. E., 1991, Contemp, Phys .. 32,

219.

Aoki, H., 1987. Rep. Proq. Phys .. 50. 6-5. Mack inncn. A., 1986, Sci, Proq., 7(), 521.

Prange, R, E,. and Girvin, S. M., ooilnr~.1987~ The Quamum Hall Effect (New York: Springer-Verlag).

Van Degrift, C. T ~ Cage, M. E .. and Girvin, S. M .. 1990, Am" J. Phys., 58, 109. (A very useful guide io the literature in thi area up to 1990.)

The integer quantum Hall effecl Buuiker, M., 198 ,Phys. R~('. B. 38, 9375.

Kent, A. 1.. McKitterick, D. J." Challis. L. J." Hawker. P., Mellor, C. 1 .. and Henini, M., ] 992, (ro be publisnec).

1_7

von Klitzing, K .. 1986, Rec. Mod. Phys., 58, 519. (The obel prize lecture, Dec. 1985.)

Von Klitzing, K., Dordu. D .. and Pepper, M., 1980, Phys. Rev. Leu.,

45, 494. (The Nobel prize-winning paper.) Halperin, B. I.. 1.9.86. Scient. Alii., 254, 40. Hartland. A .. 1988. Cantemp. P/7YS .. 29.477.

Hartland, A., Jones, K .. Williari1s, K. M., Gallagher, B, L., and Galloway, T., 1991. Phys: Reo. Lett., 66.99.

Laughlin, R. B., 1981, Phys. R{'~'. 13,23,563_. (A theoretical argument based on gauge in variance later extended by Halperin, B. I., 1981, Phys. ReI', 13,25, 2185.)

Paalauen, M, A .. TSlIi, D. C., and Gossard, A. C; 19.8~. Pliys. Rev. B, 25, 5566.

Stormer. 1-'1. L.. and Tsui, D, C. 19&3, Science, 220. 1241.

The fractional quantum Hall effect

Chakraborty, T.. and Pieiilainen, P., editons, 198.8, The Fractional Quantun: Half EjJi'rr (New York; Springer-Verlag).

Clark. R. G., and Maksym; p, A., 1989, Physics World, Z, 39.

T ui, D. C. and Stormer, H. L., .1986, IEEE J. quam. Elec.. Q.E-22. 1711.

Tsui, D, C., Stormer, H. L.. and Gossard. A. c, 19K?, Plws. n-« Leu., 48. 1559. (The first observation of the fractional quantum Hall effect.] Wilczek, 1' .. 1991, SCi. Amer. 264. 24.

Qaantization of ballistic transport

Beenakker, C. W. J., and Van H uten, H.. 1991. Semlconductor Heterostructures and Nunostrurtures. edited by H. Ehrenreich and D. Turnbull (San Diego: Academic Press), p, I.

Main. P. c., Beton, P.H. Snell, B. R., Veves, A. J, M., Owers-Bradley, J. R., Eaves, L. Beaumont. S. roo and Wilkin on, C. D. W .. 1989, Phys. Rev. 13, 40, 10033. (A direct demonstration of the effect of soartering Oil the series addition of ballistic resistors.]

Pepper, M" and Wharam, D. A .. 1988, Physic,\" World, 1,45.

Van Wecs, B. L Van Houien. H .. Beenakker, C. W . .I., Williamson, J.

G., K uwenhoven, L. P .. , Van Der Marel, D" and Faxon, C. T:, 1988, Pity s. Rei). Leu.. 60, 848.

Wharam, D. A., Thornton, T. J., Newbury, Roo Pepper, M., Ahmed, H., Fro I, J. E. F .. Ha ko. D. G., Peacock, D. C .. Ritchie, D, A .. and Jones. G. A c.. 1988. J. Phys. C, 21, L209.

{The first independent observations of quantization were reported in these last [WO papers.l

A.pplications of lew-dhaensiona I structures

Jewell, J. L., Harbison. J. P., and Scherer . .'\ .. 1991, Scient. AnI .. 265. 56.

(A good discussion with many references is given in the book by Weisbuch and Vinter.)

Lawrence Challis has been Professor or Physics at Nottingham University since 1971. He read physics at Merton College, Oxford, then worked at the Clarendon labcratory on liquid 3He and Kapitza resistance before becoming a lecturer at Nottingham in 1959. He has had visiting positions at Standford, Centre d'Etudes Nucleaires, Grenoble, and the Universities of Canterbury Monash and New South Wales. He has worked 11 phonon interactions with Jahn-Teller ions, crossing effects in phonon scattering and since 1985·, phonon interactions with 2D electron gases as par! of the Nottingham NUMBERS programme on LD.s.