Shearing a fermionic gas and quantized friction

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that in a sheared fermionic gas with minimal imperfections, the frictional force becomes quantized, with the friction coefficient proportional to Planck's constant and dependent solely on the bulge's properties.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of quantized friction in a fermionic gas, linking friction to quantum properties and surface imperfections, a novel insight in nanoscale friction studies.

Findings

Frictional force is quantized as F=m*mu*v.

Friction coefficient mu is proportional to Planck's constant h.

Mu depends only on the bulge's properties, not on gas or velocity.

Abstract

The frictional forces in sheared fermionic gas are investigated. The gas is sheared by two sliding surfaces. Except for a small imperfection (bulge) on one of them, the surfaces are totally smooth. We show that when the bulge is extremely small, and the gas is also confined in the lateral dimension, the frictional force (F) is quantized. That is, F=m*mu*v, where v is the sliding velocity with respect to the lubricant gas, m is an integer, and mu is the friction coefficient. It is also shown that mu is proportional to the Planck constant h and depends only on the bulge's properties (it does not depend on either the gas properties or the sliding velocity).