Browse Physics

A study of the thermoelectric properties of the doped insulator, strontium titanate, shows that it superconducts with the lowest charge density ever observed.

New experiments show that holes in silicon can transport spin over surprisingly large distances, adding $p$-type semiconductors to the toolkit of materials for spintronics.

A new optical experiment provides further proof that quantum mechanics is not hiding some classical framework beneath its veneer of context-dependent observations.

Researchers have applied a combination of an electric field and mechanical strain to a system of quantum dots in order to correct for asymmetries that usually prevent these semiconductor nanostructures from emitting entangled photons.

Electric-field control of the spin-orbit field in [111] quantum wells lengthens the spin coherence time.

Researchers predict that Majorana fermions can be found in magnetic field vortices in the bulk of the superconductor ${\text{Cu}}_x{\text{Bi}}_2{\text{Se}}_3$.

Rapid frequency variations in the photons generated by a quantum dot pose difficulties for practical applications of new quantum dot materials.

Measurement of the Coulomb drag correlation in a two-dimensional electron gas provides a quantitative explanation for the movement of electron-hole packets opposite to the expected direction.

Researchers develop models that could exhibit a fractional quantum Hall effect in the absence of an external magnetic field.

An ingenious experiment has probed the collective response of the quantum Hall stripe phase.

The potential discovery of anyons in a fractional quantum Hall device tests the limits of what is known about particles confined to two dimensions.

The ability to detect the spin Hall effect electrically could make an obscure but intriguing effect more accessible to research.

Theorists and experimentalists have long been trying to explain the existence of a fractional quantum Hall effect where it is not expected.

The first experimental observation of Landau levels in the surface states of a three-dimensional topological insulator confirms the levels obey unconventional quantization rules.

The exactly quantized magneto-optical response of a topological insulator is a direct result of the Berry phase protected states on its surface.

A little-known and subtle optical effect in combination with state-of-the-art pulsed laser techniques holds considerable promise as a sensitive way to study physical properties (including spin phenomena) in nanometer scale structures.

The race for realizing Majorana fermions—elusive particles that act as their own antiparticles—heats up, but we still await ideal materials to work with.

The combination of trivial and topological band insulators with a superconductor is bringing anyons—particles that behave neither according to purely Bose nor Fermi statistics—into the three-dimensional world.

The energy-momentum relationship of electrons on the surface of an ideal topological insulator forms a cone, which, when warped, can lead to unusual phenomena such as enhanced interference around defects and a magnetically ordered exotic surface.

A theoretical analysis of recent experiments suggests that a key feature of a topological quantum computer—the unusual statistics of quasiparticles in the quantum Hall effect—may finally have been observed.