P T Madathil, C Wang, S K Singh, A Gupta, K A Villegas Rosales, Y J Chung, K W West, K W Baldwin, L N Pfeiffer, L W Engel, M Shayegan
Low-disorder two-dimensional electron systems in the presence of a strong, perpendicular magnetic field terminate at very small Landau level filling factors in a Wigner crystal (WC), where the electrons form an ordered array to minimize the Coulomb repulsion. The nature of this exotic, many-body, quantum phase is yet to be fully understood and experimentally revealed. Here we probe one of WC's most fundamental parameters, namely, the energy gap that determines its low-temperature conductivity, in record mobility, ultrahigh-purity, two-dimensional electrons confined to GaAs quantum wells...
March 1, 2024: Physical Review Letters