Experimental tunneling ratchets
Adiabatically rocked electron ratchets, defined by quantum confinement in semiconductor heterostructures, were experimentally studied in a regime where tunneling contributed to the particle flow. The rocking-induced electron flow reverses direction as a function of temperature. This result confirms a recent prediction of fundamentally different behavior of classical versus quantum ratchets. A wave-mechanical model reproduced the temperature-induced current reversal and provides an intuitive explanation.
Linke
H
School of Physics, University of New South Wales, Sydney 2052, Australia. Division of Solid State Physics, Lund University, Box 118, 221 00 Lund, Sweden.
Humphrey
TE
Lofgren
A
Sushkov
AO
Newbury
R
Taylor
RP
Omling
P