Specific Heat Anomaly and Adiabatic Hysteresis in Disordered Electron Systems in a Magnetic Field

TL;DR

This paper investigates how disorder and interactions in two-dimensional electron systems lead to unusual thermodynamic behaviors, including specific heat anomalies and hysteresis effects, indicating local moment formation.

Contribution

It introduces a theoretical analysis of thermodynamic anomalies and hysteresis in disordered electron systems, highlighting the role of localization and interactions.

Findings

Non-monotonic specific heat behavior in magnetic fields

Prediction of adiabatic hysteresis in magnetoconductance

Indication of local moment formation in disordered systems

Abstract

We consider the thermodynamic behavior of a disordered interacting electron system in two dimensions. We show that the corrections to the thermodynamic potential in the weakly localized regime give rise to a non monotonic behavior of the specific heat both in temperature and magnetic field. From this effect we predict the appearance of adiabatic hysteresis in the magnetoconductance. Our results can be interpreted as precursor effect of formation of local moments in disordered electron systems. We also comment on the relevance of our analysis in three dimensional systems.