Non-Fermi-Liquid Behavior of Compressible States of Electrons on the Lowest Landau Level

TL;DR

This paper investigates the non-Fermi-liquid behavior of compressible electron states at even denominator fractions in a strong magnetic field, highlighting impurity scattering and interactions as key factors.

Contribution

It demonstrates that impurity scattering and its interference with interactions lead to intrinsic non-Fermi-liquid transport at these states.

Findings

Impurity scattering affects transport properties.

Interference with electron-electron and electron-phonon interactions induces non-Fermi-liquid behavior.

Compressible states at EDFs lack an energy gap and resemble a Fermi surface.

Abstract

Experiments show that at even denominator fractions (EDFs) ($\nu=1/2, 3/4, 3/2$,...) the two-dimensional electron gas in a strong magnetic field becomes compressible, has no energy gap, and demonstrates the presence of an ostensible Fermi surface. Since this phenomenon results from a minimization of the interaction, rather than the kinetic energy, the EDF states might well exhibit deviations from a conventional Fermi liquid. We show that impurity scattering at EDFs and its interference with electron-electron and electron-phonon interactions provide examples of intrinsically non-Fermi-liquid transport.