Published in

Nature Research, Nature Communications, 1(7), 2016

DOI: 10.1038/ncomms12974

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Spatially inhomogeneous electron state deep in the extreme quantum limit of strontium titanate

Journal article published in 2016 by Anand Bhattacharya ORCID, Brian Skinner, Guru Khalsa ORCID, Alexey V. Suslov
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.

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Abstract

AbstractWhen an electronic system is subjected to a sufficiently strong magnetic field that the cyclotron energy is much larger than the Fermi energy, the system enters the extreme quantum limit (EQL) and becomes susceptible to a number of instabilities. Bringing a three-dimensional electronic system deeply into the EQL can be difficult however, since it requires a small Fermi energy, large magnetic field, and low disorder. Here we present an experimental study of the EQL in lightly-doped single crystals of strontium titanate. Our experiments probe deeply into the regime where theory has long predicted an interaction-driven charge density wave or Wigner crystal state. A number of interesting features arise in the transport in this regime, including a striking re-entrant nonlinearity in the current–voltage characteristics. We discuss these features in the context of possible correlated electron states, and present an alternative picture based on magnetic-field induced puddling of electrons.