CPM Seminar

The electrical conductance quantum e²/h was first observed experimentally in the context of the quantum Hall effect. Since then it has become a hallmark of electronic nanoscale physics where its observation is the signature of quantum confinement and ballistic transport of electrons.

In this talk I will discuss the physics that gives rise to a thermal analog of the electrical conductance quantum, namely, the universal quantum of thermal conductance[1] which is given by k^univ = pi² k_B² T/3h where k_B is the Boltzmann constant, h is Planck's constant and T is the temperature. It is predicted to be experimentally observable at low temperatures in a ballistic phonon regime in dielectric nanowires adiabatically coupled to reservoirs and in other nanoscale systems. It is universal, being independent of the characteristics of the material and of the statistics obeyed by the carriers that transport heat through a nanowire: It is predicted to describe thermal transport by Planck bosons, fermions and `exclusons,' quasi-particles obeying Haldane's generalized exclusion statistics such as occur in the fractional quantum Hall regime.

[1] L. G. C. Rego and G. Kirczenow, Phys. Rev. Lett. 81, 232 (1998); Phys. Rev. Lett. 81, 5038 (1998); Phys. Rev.B59,13080(1999). Physical Review Focus: http://publish.aps.org/FOCUS/v2/st2.html

Wednesday, September 15th 1999, 15:30
Ernest Rutherford Physics Building, room 114