Dr. Matthew Grayson
Institute: Walter Schottky Institute, Technische Universitaet Muenchen

Title: Bending the Quantum Hall Effect: Metal-insulator transition in one dimension

Abstract: One-dimensional conductors are the wires that will connect the circuits of tomorrows nanoworld, so it is important to characterize their possible conducting phases. We study a novel one-dimensional wire state which arises at the corner of two quantum Hall systems joined at a 90° angle, and observe a one-dimensional metal-insulator transition. Such non-planar confinement structures are new to the quantum Hall effect and reveal the first observation of a macroscopic one- dimensional state whose conductance increases with decreasing temperature. This system can map out generic properties of one-dimensional conductors since the metallic, critical, or insulating character is tunable with an external parameter, the magnetic field.