Nonequilibrium dephasing in an electronic Mach-Zehnder interferometer

Phys Rev Lett. 2008 May 16;100(19):196807. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.100.196807. Epub 2008 May 16.

Abstract

We study nonequilibrium dephasing in an electronic Mach-Zehnder interferometer. We demonstrate that the shot noise at the beam splitter of the interferometer generates an ensemble of nonequilibrium electron density configurations and that electron interactions induce configuration-specific phase shifts of an interfering electron. The resulting dephasing exhibits two characteristic features, a lobe pattern in the visibility and phase jumps of pi, in good agreement with experimental data.