Experimental Evidence for a Coulomb Gap in Two Dimensions

TL;DR

This study provides experimental evidence for a Coulomb gap in a two-dimensional silicon electron system, demonstrating a specific resistivity behavior at low temperatures and densities consistent with Coulomb gap theory.

Contribution

The paper presents the first detailed experimental observation of Coulomb gap behavior in two-dimensional electron systems at low temperatures and densities.

Findings

Resistivity follows an exponential temperature dependence consistent with a Coulomb gap.

Near the metal-insulator transition, the resistivity prefactor approaches the quantum resistance h/e^2.

At very low densities, the resistivity prefactor decreases with decreasing electron density.

Abstract

We have studied the resistivity, $\rho$, of a two-dimensional electron system in silicon in the temperature range 200 mK < T < 7.5 K at zero magnetic field at low electron densities, when the electron system is in the insulating regime. Our results show that at an intermediate temperature range $\rho=\rho_0 exp[(T_0/T)^{1/2}]$ for at least four orders of magnitude up to 3x10^9 Ohms. This behavior is consistent with the existence of a Coulomb gap. Near the metal/insulator transition, the prefactor was found to be close to $h/e^2$, and resistivity scales with temperature. For very low electron densities, $n_s$, the prefactor diminishes with diminishing $n_s$. A comparison with the theory shows that a specific set of conditions are necessary to observe the behavior of resistivity consistent with the existence of the Coulomb gap.