2003/08/26 by A. C. Graham, Graham, A. C., K. J. Thomas +10 · 2 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #Magnetic properties of thin films #Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics (cond-mat.mes-hall) #Quantum and electron transport phenomena #Semiconductor Quantum Structures and Devices #cond-mat.mes-hall
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.cond-mat/0308550
4 pages, 4 figures, to be published in Physical Review Letters
arxiv created 2003/08/26 · openalex publication_date 2003/08/26 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
We report conductance measurements of ballistic one-dimensional (1D) wires defined in GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructures in an in-plane magnetic field, B. When the Zeeman energy is equal to the 1D subband energy spacing, the spin-split subband N(up-spin) intersects (N+1)(down-spin), where N is the index of the spin-degenerate 1D subband. At the crossing of N=1(up-spin) and N=2(down-spin) subbands, there is a spontaneous splitting giving rise to an additional conductance structure evolving from the 1.5(2e2/h) plateau. With further increase in B, the structure develops into a plateau and lowers to 2e2/h. With increasing temperature and magnetic field the structure shows characteristics of the 0.7 structure. Our results suggest that at low densities a spontaneous spin splitting occurs whenever two 1D subbands of opposite spins cross.