Atomically Thin Current Pathways in Graphene through Kekulé-O Engineering.

We demonstrate that the current flow in graphene can be guided on atomically thin current pathways by the engineering of Kekulé-O distortions. A grain boundary in these distortions separates the system into topologically distinct regions and induces a ballistic domain-wall state. The state is independent of the orientation of the grain boundary with respect to the graphene sublattice and permits guiding the current on arbitrary paths. As the state is gapped, the current flow can be switched by electrostatic gates. Our findings are explained by a generalization of the Jackiw-Rebbi model, where the electrons behave in one region of the system as Fermions with an effective complex mass, making the device not only promising for technological applications but also a test-ground for concepts from high-energy physics. An atomic model supported by DFT calculations demonstrates that the system can be realized by decorating graphene with Ti atoms.

Electron Optics in Phosphorene pn Junctions: Negative Reflection and Anti-Super-Klein Tunneling.

Ballistic electrons in phosphorene pn junctions show optical-like phenomena. Phosphorene is modeled by a tight-binding Hamiltonian that describes its electronic structure at low energies, where the electrons behave in the armchair direction as massive Dirac Fermions and in the orthogonal zigzag direction as Schrödinger electrons. Applying the continuum approximation, we derive the electron optics laws in phosphorene pn junctions, which show very particular and unusual properties. Because of the anisotropy of the electronic structure, these laws depend strongly on the orientation of the junction with respect to the sublattice. Negative and anomalous reflection are observed for tilted junctions, whereas the typical specular reflection is found only if the junction is parallel to the zigzag or armchair edges. Moreover, omni-directional total reflection, called anti-super-Klein tunneling, is observed if the junction is parallel to the armchair edge. Applying the nonequilibrium Green's function method on the tight-binding model, we calculate numerically the current flow. The good agreement of both approaches confirms the atypical transport properties, which can be used in nanodevices to collimate and filter the electron flow or to switch its direction.

Robustness of optimal transport in disordered interacting many-body networks.

The robustness of quantum transport under various perturbations is analyzed in disordered interacting many-body systems, which are constructed from the embedded Gaussian random matrix ensembles (EGEs). The transport efficiency can be enhanced drastically, if centrosymmetry (csEGE) is imposed. When the csEGE is perturbed with an ordinary EGE, the transport efficiency in the optimal cases is reduced significantly, while in the suboptimal cases the changes are less pronounced. Qualitatively the same behavior is observed, when parity and centrosymmetry are broken by block perturbations. Analyzing the influence of the environment coupling, optimal transport is observed at a certain coupling strength, while too weak and too strong coupling reduce the transport. Taking into account the effects of decoherence, in the EGE the transport efficiency approaches its maximum at a finite nonzero decoherence strength (environment-assisted transport). In the csEGE the efficiency decays monotonically with the decoherence but is always larger than in the EGE.

Efficient quantum transport in disordered interacting many-body networks.

The coherent transport of n fermions in disordered networks of l single-particle states connected by k-body interactions is studied. These networks are modeled by embedded Gaussian random matrix ensemble (EGE). The conductance bandwidth and the ensemble-averaged total current attain their maximal values if the system is highly filled n∼l-1 and k∼n/2. For the cases k=1 and k=n the bandwidth is minimal. We show that for all parameters the transport is enhanced significantly whenever centrosymmetric embedded Gaussian ensemble (csEGE) are considered. In this case the transmission shows numerous resonances of perfect transport. Analyzing the transmission by spectral decomposition, we find that centrosymmetry induces strong correlations and enhances the extrema of the distributions. This suppresses destructive interference effects in the system and thus causes backscattering-free transmission resonances that enhance the overall transport. The distribution of the total current for the csEGE has a very large dominating peak for n=l-1, close to the highest observed currents.