Electron injection in a nanotube: noise correlations and entanglement

TL;DR

This paper investigates electron injection in a metallic carbon nanotube, analyzing noise correlations and entanglement phenomena, revealing effective charges and positive correlations indicative of many-body entanglement in a Luttinger liquid.

Contribution

It provides a detailed analysis of noise and entanglement effects in electron transport through a nanotube with tunneling injection, including the impact of Fermi liquid leads.

Findings

Shot noise shows effective charges different from electron charge.

Positive noise correlations indicate entanglement between quasiparticles.

Entanglement involves many-body states of bosonic collective excitations.

Abstract

Transport through a metallic carbon nanotube is considered, where electrons are injected in the bulk by a scanning tunneling microscope tip. The charge current and noise are computed both in the absence and in the presence of one dimensional Fermi liquid leads. For an infinite homogeneous nanotube, the shot noise exhibits effective charges different from the electron charge. Noise correlations between both ends of the nanotube are positive, and occur to second order only in the tunneling amplitude. The positive correlations are symptomatic of an entanglement phenomenon between quasiparticles moving right and left from the tip. This entanglement involves many body states of the boson operators which describe the collective excitations of the Luttinger liquid.