Charge solitons in closed two-dimensional tunnel junction arrays

Abstract

Charge solitons driven by external voltage sources iii the two-dimensional array of mesoscopic tunnel junctions which form a closed loop structure are theoretically investigated in this work. The geometry of the structure is reflected in modeling the capacitances between any of two conducting islands; the capacitances decay as 1/r where r is the distance between two islands, which is consistent with a recent result by the full-capacitance consideration. We have used the semiclassical model to describe the junctions and performed Monte Carlo calculations to study the dynamics of the charge solitons traveling around the loop. Our major finding in this work is the new Coulomb blockade phenomena in the two-dimensional array, which gives rise to additional Coulomb blockade gaps in the I-V characteristics. We attribute the new Coulomb blockade phenomena to the interplay of the long range interaction governed by the 1/r law and the two-dimensional geometry. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.