Gate-Defined Electron Interferometer in Bilayer Graphene

Nano Lett. 2022 Aug 10;22(15):6292-6297. doi: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.2c01874. Epub 2022 Jul 26.

Abstract

We present an electron interferometer defined purely by electrostatic gating in an encapsulated bilayer graphene. This minimizes possible sample degradation introduced by conventional etching methods when preparing quantum devices. The device quality is demonstrated by observing Aharonov-Bohm (AB) oscillations with a period of h/e, h/2e, h/3e, and h/4e, witnessing a coherence length of many microns. The AB oscillations as well as the type of carriers (electrons or holes) are seamlessly tunable with gating. The coherence length longer than the ring perimeter and semiclassical trajectory of the carrier are established from the analysis of the temperature and magnetic field dependence of the oscillations. Our gate-defined ring geometry has the potential to evolve into a platform for exploring correlated quantum states such as superconductivity in interferometers in twisted bilayer graphene.

Keywords: Aharonov-Bohm effect; Bilayer graphene; band gap; etching; gate-defined device; interferometer.