Aharonov-Bohm oscillations and resonant tunneling in strongly correlated quantum dots

TL;DR

This paper studies how strong electron interactions in quantum dots affect Aharonov-Bohm oscillations and resonant tunneling, revealing flux-dependent level renormalization and flux symmetry breaking.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analysis of flux-dependent renormalization effects and phase shifts in strongly correlated quantum dots, highlighting the impact of Coulomb interactions.

Findings

Flux-dependent renormalization of the dot level

Fine structure in current oscillations due to quantum fluctuations

Flux symmetry breaking in nonlinear conductance

Abstract

We investigate Aharonov-Bohm oscillations of the current through a strongly correlated quantum dot embedded in an arbitrary scattering geometry. Resonant-tunneling processes lead to a flux-dependent renormalization of the dot level. As a consequence we obtain a fine structure of the current oscillations which is controlled by quantum fluctuations. Strong Coulomb repulsion leads to a continuous bias voltage dependent phase shift and, in the nonlinear response regime, destroys the symmetry of the differential conductance under a sign change of the external flux.