Do Quantum Dots Break Time-reversal Symmetry? – Harsh Mathur

Date: Thu. March 17th, 2005, 4:15 pm-5:15 pm
Location: Rockefeller 301

Semiconductor quantum dots that contain a few hundred electrons have fascinating electronic properties shaped by the interplay of electron-electron interaction and randomness (due to chaotic scattering of electrons from device boundaries). Transport experiments that probe the electronic state and theoretical efforts to understand them will be reviewed. Our prediction of a new state of electronic matter in strongly interacting quantum dots will be discussed. In this novel electron liquid time-reversal symmetry is spontaneously broken and there is a persistent current in the electronic ground state even in the absence of superconductivity.