Observation of Chiral Heat Transport in the Quantum Hall Regime

TL;DR

This study demonstrates chiral heat transport along the edges of a quantum Hall system, revealing how heat propagates unidirectionally and cools over distance, using micron-scale heaters and thermometers.

Contribution

It provides direct experimental evidence of chiral heat transport in the quantum Hall regime with localized heating and thermoelectric detection.

Findings

Thermoelectric signals appear only downstream of heaters in the ν=1 state.

Heat propagates along the edge and diminishes with distance, indicating cooling.

Chiral heat transport is confirmed in the quantum Hall regime.

Abstract

Heat transport in the quantum Hall regime is investigated using micron-scale heaters and thermometers positioned along the edge of a millimeter-scale two dimensional electron system (2DES). The heaters rely on localized current injection into the 2DES, while the thermometers are based on the thermoelectric effect. In the $\nu = 1$ integer quantized Hall state, a thermoelectric signal appears at an edge thermometer only when it is "downstream," in the sense of electronic edge transport, from the heater. When the distance between the heater and the thermometer is increased, the thermoelectric signal is reduced, showing that the electrons cool as they propagate along the edge.