Dephasing of Electrons in Mesoscopic Metal Wires

Details Dephasing of Electrons in Mesoscopic Metal Wires Dephasing of Electrons in Mesoscopic Metal Wires

2003-02-12

arxiv.org/abs/cond-mat/0302235v2

Phys. Rev. B 68, 085413 (2003)

Physics

Condensed Matter

Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics

16 pages, 11 figures, to be published in Physical Review B

Scientific paper

10.1103/PhysRevB.68.085413

We have extracted the phase coherence time $\tau_{\phi}$ of electronic quasiparticles from the low field magnetoresistance of weakly disordered wires made of silver, copper and gold. In samples fabricated using our purest silver and gold sources, $\tau_{\phi}$ increases as $T^{-2/3}$ when the temperature $T$ is reduced, as predicted by the theory of electron-electron interactions in diffusive wires. In contrast, samples made of a silver source material of lesser purity or of copper exhibit an apparent saturation of $\tau_{\phi}$ starting between 0.1 and 1 K down to our base temperature of 40 mK. By implanting manganese impurities in silver wires, we show that even a minute concentration of magnetic impurities having a small Kondo temperature can lead to a quasi saturation of $\tau_{\phi}$ over a broad temperature range, while the resistance increase expected from the Kondo effect remains hidden by a large background. We also measured the conductance of Aharonov-Bohm rings fabricated using a very pure copper source and found that the amplitude of the $h/e$ conductance oscillations increases strongly with magnetic field. This set of experiments suggests that the frequently observed ``saturation'' of $\tau_{\phi}$ in weakly disordered metallic thin films can be attributed to spin-flip scattering from extremely dilute magnetic impurities, at a level undetectable by other means.

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