Rectified voltage induced by a microwave field in a confined two-dimensional electron gas with a mesoscopic static vortex

TL;DR

This paper models how a microwave field induces a rectified voltage in a confined two-dimensional electron gas with an insulating region represented as a static vortex, explaining recent experimental observations.

Contribution

It introduces a bosonized theoretical framework to analyze microwave-induced rectification in a 2D electron gas with insulating regions modeled as vortices.

Findings

Rectified voltage arises from non-commuting coordinates near classical turning points.

Vortex-induced flux affects the electron fluid's kinetic momenta and Hall current.

The theory aligns with recent experimental results by J. Zhang et al.

Abstract

We investigate the effect of a microwave field on a confined two dimensional electron gas which contains an insulating region comparable to the Fermi wavelength. The insulating region causes the electron wave function to vanish in that region. We describe the insulating region as a static vortex. The vortex carries a flux which is determined by vanishing of the charge density of the electronic fluid due to the insulating region. The sign of the vorticity for a hole is opposite to the vorticity for adding additional electrons. The vorticity gives rise to non-commuting kinetic momenta. The two dimensional electron gas is described as fluid with a density which obeys the Fermi-Dirac statistics. The presence of the confinement potential gives rise to vanishing kinetic momenta in the vicinity of the classical turning points. As a result, the Cartesian coordinate do not commute and gives rise to a Hall current which in the presence of a modified Fermi-Surface caused by the microwave field results in a rectified voltage. Using a Bosonized formulation of the two dimensional gas in the presence of insulating regions allows us to compute the rectified current. The proposed theory may explain the experimental results recently reported by J. Zhang et al.