A current can be driven along a two-dimensional electron gas by a surface acoustic wave. When passed through a narrow channel, this current becomes quantised, as an integer number of electrons is transported in a quantum dot in each minimum of the wave. See here for more information on our work on a quantised current standard using surface acoustic waves.
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| SAW potential along a depleted 1D channel | SAW carries a quantised current I = nef (n is the number of electrons in each SAW minimum, f is the SAW frequency (~3 GHz)) |
We have proposed a solid-state quantum computer based on the transport of individual electrons in the minima of a surface acoustic wave in a narrow channel.
We aim to construct the building blocks of such a quantum computer:
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| Two channels with tunnel barrier between them | Scanning electron micrograph of two channels with a tunnel barrier between them |
Each electron combines with a hole to give a polarised photon for read-out or as a single-photon source.
Much important physics can be discovered by learning to manipulate qubits.
PhD Projects are available to investigate many different aspects of this work.
A printable (PDF) description of this project is available here (870kB).
For more information, please contact Prof Chris Ford.