There is increasing experimental evidence for fractional quantum Hall effect at filling factor $ν=2+3/8$. Modeling it as a system of composite fermions, we study the problem of interacting composite fermions by a number of methods. In our variational study, we consider the Fermi sea, the Pfaffian paired state, and bubble and stripe phases of composite fermions, and find that the Fermi sea state is favored for a wide range of transverse thickness. However, when we incorporate interactions between composite fermions through composite-fermion diagonalization on systems with up to 25 composite fermions, we find that a gap opens at the Fermi level, suggesting that inter-composite fermion interaction can induce fractional quantum Hall effect at $ν=2+3/8$. The resulting state is seen to be distinct from the Pfaffian wave function.
Exact diagonalization of a two-dimensional electron gas in a strong magnetic field in the disk geometry shows that there exists a filling factor range in the second Landau level where the states significantly differ from those in the lowest Landau level. We show that the difference arises because the interaction between composite fermions is not negligible in higher Landau levels, as indicated by a substantial mixing between composite-fermion Landau-like levels, or lambda levels. We find that the exact ground state is well reproduced by composite fermion theory with lambda level mixing incorpo…
The physics of the state at even denominator fractional fillings of Landau levels depends on the Coulomb pseudopotentials, and produces, in different GaAs Landau levels, a composite fermion Fermi sea, a stripe phase, or, possibly, a paired composite fermion state. We consider here even denominator fractions in graphene, which has different pseudopotentials as well as a possible four fold degeneracy of each Landau level. We test various composite fermion Fermi sea wave functions (fully polarized, SU(2) singlet, SU(4) singlet) as well as the paired composite fermion states in the n=0 and $n=1$ L…
We construct explicit lowest-Landau-level wave functions for the composite-fermion Fermi sea and its low energy excitations following a recently developed approach [Pu, Wu and Jain, Phys. Rev. B 96, 195302 (2018)] and demonstrate them to be very accurate representations of the Coulomb eigenstates. We further ask how the Berry phase associated with a closed loop around the Fermi circle, predicted to be $π$ in a Dirac composite fermion theory satisfying particle-hole symmetry [D. T. Son, Phys. Rev. X 5, 031027 (2015)], is affected by Landau level mixing. For this purpose, we consider a simple mo…
We consider the two lowest Landau levels at half filling. In the higher Landau level (nu =5/2), we find a first order phase transition separating a compressible striped phase from a paired quantum Hall state, which is identified as the Moore-Read state. The critical point is very near the Coulomb potential and the transition can be driven by increasing the width of the electron layer. We find a much weaker transition (either second order or a crossover) from pairing to the composite fermion Fermi liquid behavior. A very similar picture is obtained for the lowest Landau level but the transition…
The electron-electron interaction in the Landau levels of bilayer graphene is markedly different from that of conventional semiconductors such as GaAs. We show that in the zeroth Landau level of bilayer graphene, in the orbital which is dominated by the non-relativistic second Landau level wave function, by tuning the magnetic field a topological quantum phase transition from an Abelian composite fermion to a non-Abelian parton fractional quantum Hall state can be induced at filling factors $1/2, ~2/5$ and $3/7$. The parton states host exotic anyons that can potentially be utilized to store an…
An effective field theory of composite Dirac fermions was proposed by Son [Phys. Rev. X 5, 031027 (2015)] as a theory of the half-filled Landau level with explicit particle-hole symmetry. We compute the electromagnetic response of this Son-Dirac theory on the level of the random phase approximation (RPA), where we pay particular attention to the effect of an additional composite-fermion dipole term that is needed to restore Galilean invariance. We find that once this dipole correction is taken into account, spurious interband transitions and collective modes that are present in the response of…
Particle-hole symmetry breaking in the fractional quantum Hall effect has recently been studied both theoretically and experimentally with most works focusing on non-Abelian states in the second electronic Landau level. In this work, we theoretically investigate particle-hole symmetry breaking of incompressible fractional quantum Hall states in the lowest Landau level under the influence of the realistic effect of a finite magnetic field strength. A finite magnetic field induces Landau level and sub-band mixing which are known to break particle-hole symmetry at the level of the Hamiltonian. We…
We construct an action for the composite Dirac fermion consistent with symmetries of electrons projected to the lowest Landau level. First we construct a generalization of the $g=2$ electron that gives a smooth massless limit on any curved background. Using the symmetries of the microscopic electron theory in this massless limit we find a number of constraints on any low-energy effective theory. We find that any low-energy description must couple to a geometry which exhibits nontrivial curvature even on flat space-times. Any composite fermion must have an electric dipole moment proportional an…
The relation between the conductivity tensors of Composite Fermions and electrons is extended to second generation Composite Fermions. It is shown that it crucially depends on the coupling matrix for the Chern-Simons gauge field. The results are applied to a model of interacting Composite Fermions that can explain both the anomalous plateaus in spin polarization and the corresponding maxima in the resistivity observed in recent transport experiments.
We argue that the naively expected singularities of the Fermi surface, in the mixed composite boson - composite fermion states proposed [S.H. Simon et al., PRL 91, 046803(2003)] for the evolution of ν= 1 bilayer quantum Hall system with distance, are obliterated. Our conclusion is based on a careful analysis of the momentum distribution in ν= 1/2 single-layer composite-fermion state. We point out to a possibility of the phenomenon hitherto unknown outside Kondo lattice systems when, in a translationally invariant system, Fermi-liquid-like portion of electrons enlarges its volume.
A rich pattern of fractional quantum Hall states in graphene double layers can be naturally explained in terms of two-component composite fermions carrying both intra- and inter-layer vortices.
The half filled Landau level is expected to be approximately particle-hole symmetric, which requires an extension of the Halperin-Lee-Read (HLR) theory of the compressible state observed at this filling. Recent work indicates that, when particle-hole symmetry is preserved, the composite Fermions experience a quantized $π$-Berry phase upon winding around the composite Fermi-surface, analogous to Dirac fermions at the surface of a 3D topological insulator. In contrast, the effective low energy theory of the composite fermion liquid originally proposed by HLR lacks particle-hole symmetry and has …
We investigate the properties of composite fermions with four attached flux quanta through tilted field experiments near Landau level filling factor nu = 3/4. The observed collapse of fractional quantum Hall gaps in the vicinity of this quarter-filling state can be comprehensively understood in terms of composite fermions with mass and spin. Remarkably, the effective mass and g-factor of these four flux quanta composite fermions around nu = 3/4 are very similar to those of two flux quanta composite fermions around nu = 3/2.
In two-dimensional electron systems confined to wide AlAs quantum wells, composite fermions around the filling factor $ν$ = 3/2 are fully spin polarized but possess a valley degree of freedom. Here we measure the energy needed to completely valley polarize these composite fermions as a function of electron density. Comparing our results to the existing theory, we find overall good quantitative agreement, but there is an unexpected trend: The measured composite fermion valley polarization energy, normalized to the Coulomb energy, decreases with decreasing density.
Fractional edge states can be viewed as integer edge states of composite fermions. We exploit this to discuss the conductance of the fractional quantized Hall states and the velocity of edge magnetoplasmons.
Fluctuations of the Chern-Simons gauge field in the composite Fermi liquid description of the half-filled Landau level are pair breaking in all angular momentum channels. For short-range electron-electron interactions these fluctuations are sufficiently strong to drive any T=0 pairing transition first order. For Coulomb interactions these fluctuations are weaker and a continuous transition is possible.
A recently developed model of interacting composite fermions, is used to investigate different composite-fermion phases. Their interaction potential allows for the formation of both solid and new quantum-liquid phases, which are interpreted in terms of second-generation composite fermions and which may be responsible for the fractional quantum Hall states observed at unusual filling factors, such as nu=4/11. Projection of the composite-fermion dynamics to a single level, involved in the derivation of the Hamiltonian of interacting composite fermions, reveals the underlying self-similarity of t…
By strictly adhering to the microscopic theory of composite fermions for the Landau-level filling fractions nu_e = p/(2 p + 1), we reproduce, with remarkable accuracy, the surface-acoustic-wave (SAW)-based experimental results by Willett and co-workers concerning two-dimensional electron systems with nu_e close to 1/2. Our results imply that the electron band mass m_b, as distinct from the composite fermion mass m_*, must undergo a substantial increase under the conditions corresponding to nu_e approximately equal to 1/2. In view of the relatively low aerial electronic densities n_e to which t…
Single particle basis functions for composite fermions are obtained from which many-composite fermion states confined to the lowest electronic Landau level can be constructed in the standard manner, i.e., by building Slater determinants. This representation enables a Monte Carlo study of systems containing a large number of composite fermions, yielding new quantitative and qualitative information. The ground state energy and the gaps to charged and neutral excitations are computed for a number of fractional quantum Hall effect (FQHE) states, earlier off-limits to a quantitative investigation. …
We construct a class of composite fermion states for bilayer electron systems in a strong transverse magnetic field, and determine quantitatively the phase diagram as a function of the layer separation, layer thickness, and electron density. We find, in general, that there are several transitions, and that the incompressible phases are separated by compressible ones. The paired states of composite fermions, described by Pfaffian wave functions, are also considered.
We calculate the effect of infrared fluctuations of the Chern-Simons gauge field on the single-particle Green's function of composite fermions in the half-filled Landau level via higher-dimensional bosonization on a curved Fermi surface. We find that composite fermions remain well-defined quasi-particles, with an effective mass given by the mean-field value, but with anomalously large damping and a spectral function that contains considerable weight away from the quasi-particle peak.
Motivated by the issue of particle-hole symmetry for the composite fermion Fermi sea at the half filled Landau level, Dam T. Son has made an intriguing proposal [Phys. Rev. X {\bf 5}, 031027 (2015)] that composite fermions are Dirac particles. We ask what features of the Dirac-composite fermion theory and its various consequences may be reconciled with the well established microscopic theory of the fractional quantum Hall effect and the 1/2 state, which is based on {\em non-relativistic} composite fermions. Starting from the microscopic theory, we derive the assertion of Son that the particle-…
Strong interactions and topology drive a wide variety of correlated ground states. Some of the most interesting of these ground states, such as fractional quantum Hall states and fractional Chern insulators, have fractionally charged quasiparticles. Correlations in these phases are captured by the binding of electrons and vortices into emergent particles called composite fermions. Composite fermion quasiparticles are randomly localized at high levels of disorder and may exhibit charge order when there is not too much disorder in the system. However, more complex correlations were predicted whe…
Excitation modes in the range $2/5 \geq ν\geq 1/3$ of the fractional quantum Hall regime are observed by resonant inelastic light scattering. Spectra of spin reversed excitations suggest a structure of lowest spin-split Landau levels of composite fermions that is similar to that of electrons. Spin-flip energies determined from spectra reveal significant composite fermion interactions. The filling factor dependence of mode energies display an abrupt change in the middle of the range when there is partial population of a composite fermion level.
In the framework of a recently developed model of interacting composite fermions restricted to a single level, we calculate the activation gaps of a second generation of spin-polarized composite fermions. These composite particles consist each of a composite fermion of the first generation and a vortex-like excitation and may be responsible for the recently observed fractional quantum Hall states at unusual filling factors such as nu=4/11,5/13,5/17, and 6/17. Because the gaps of composite fermions of the second generation are found to be more than one order of magnitude smaller than those of t…
We discuss the composite fermion pairing state in bilayer quantum Hall systems. After the evaluation of the range of the inter-layer separation in which the quantum Hall state is stabilized, we discuss the effect of inter-layer tunneling on the composite fermion pairing state at ν=1/2. We show that there is a cusp at the transition point between the Halperin (3,3,1) state and the Pfaffian state.
An understanding of the physics of half or quarter filled lowest Landau level has been achieved in terms of a Fermi sea of composite fermions, but the nature of the state at other even-denominator fractions has remained unclear. We investigate in this work Landau level fillings of the form $ν=(2n+1)/(4n+4)$, which correspond to composite fermion fillings $ν^*=n+1/2$. By considering various plausible candidate states, we rule out the composite-fermion Fermi sea and paired composite-fermion state at these filling factors, and predict that the system phase separates into stripes of $n$ and $n+1$ …
Spin excitations from a partially populated composite fermion level are studied above and below $ν=1/3$. In the range $2/7<ν<2/5$ the experiments uncover significant departures from the non-interacting composite fermion picture that demonstrate the increasing impact of interactions as quasiparticle Landau levels are filled. The observed onset of a transition from free to interacting composite fermions could be linked to condensation into the higher order states suggested by transport experiments and numerical evaluations performed in the same filling factor range.
Charged excitons of composite fermions (CFs) are considered in the fractional quantum Hall effect. Energies of the charged CF excitons are computed at $ν=1/3$ as a function of the size of exciton. We show that the charged CF exciton with size of roton is lower in energy than the unbound state of a neutral roton and a lone charge. Therefore we propose that the lowest-energy excitation of the fractional quantum Hall effect is in fact due to the charged excitons of composite fermions composed of two CF-particles and one CF-hole. We believe that charged excitons of composite fermions shed new ligh…
We show that the entanglement spectrum associated with a certain class of strongly correlated many-body states --- the wave functions proposed by Laughlin and Jain to describe the fractional quantum Hall effect --- can be very well described in terms of a simple model of non-interacting (or weakly interacting) composite fermions.
We consider electrons in two dimensions in a strong magnetic field at half filling of the lowest Landau level using the Chern-Simons approach. Starting from a lattice Hamiltonian for the electrons, we derive a path integral (PI) formulation for the composite fermions (CF) which respects the order of the operators. We use a time lattice with intermediate times in order to have a PI expressed in density fluctuations. This formulation reveals that there is no infrared (IR) singularity in the grand-canonical potential in lowest order perturbation theory.
Composite fermion metal states emerge in quantum Hall bilayers at total Landau level filling factor $ν_T$=1 when the tunneling gap collapses by application of in-plane components of the external magnetic field. Evidence of this transformation is found in the continua of spin excitations observed by inelastic light scattering below the spin-wave mode at the Zeeman energy. The low-lying spin modes are interpreted as quasiparticle excitations with simultaneous changes in spin orientation and composite fermion Landau level index.
We investigate the response of a two-dimensional electron gas, in the fractional quantum Hall regime, to the sudden appearance of a localised charged probe using the Chern-Simons theory of composite fermions. The dynamic structure factor of the electron gas is found to have a major influence on the spectral function of the probe. In particular, there is an orthogonality catastrophe when the filling factor is an even-denominator filling fraction due to the compressibility of the state, but there is no catastrophe at odd-denominator filling factors because these states have a gap to excitations.…
We propose a (4+1) dimensional Chern-Simons field theoretical description of the fractional quantum Hall effect. It suggests that composite fermions reside on a momentum manifold with a nonzero Chern number. Based on derivations from microscopic wave functions, we further show that the momentum manifold has a uniformly distributed Berry curvature. As a result, composite fermions do not follow the ordinary Newtonian dynamics as commonly believed, but the more general symplectic one. For a Landau level with the particle-hole symmetry, the theory correctly predicts its Hall conductance at half-fi…
The response of composite Fermions to large wavevector scattering has been studied through phonon drag measurements. While the response retains qualitative features of the electron system at zero magnetic field, notable discrepancies develop as the system is varied from a half-filled Landau level by changing density or field. These deviations, which appear to be inconsistent with the current picture of composite Fermions, are absent if half-filling is maintained while changing density. There remains, however, a clear deviation from the temperature dependence anticipated for 2k_F scattering.
An effective Hamiltonian for spinless electrons in the lowest Landau level (LLL) close to half filling is derived. As opposed to the treatment in standard Chern-Simons theories (CS) we first project to the LLL and only then apply a CS-transformation on the Hamiltonian. The transformed field operators act in the lowest Landau level only {\it and} have fermionic commutation relations for small wavenumbers ignoring gauge field fluctuations. When acting on the Hamiltonian at half filling the {\it gauge transformation removes the monopole term in the interaction and does not eliminate the magnetic …
We study composite fermi liquid (CFL) states in the lowest Landau level (LLL) limit at a generic filling $ν= \frac{1}{n}$. We begin with the old observation that, in compressible states, the composite fermion in the lowest Landau level should be viewed as a charge-neutral particle carrying vorticity. This leads to the absence of a Chern-Simons term in the effective theory of the CFL. We argue here that instead a Berry curvature should be enclosed by the fermi surface of composite fermions, with the total Berry phase fixed by the filling fraction $ϕ_B=-2πν$. We illustrate this point with the CF…
The composite-fermion approach as formulated in the fermion Chern-Simons theory has been very successful in describing the physics of the lowest Landau level near Landau level filling factor 1/2. Recent work has emphasized the fact that the true quasiparticles at these filling factors are electrically neutral and carry an electric dipole moment. In a previous work, we discussed at length two formulations in terms of dipolar quasiparticles. Here we briefly review one approach - termed electron-centered quasiparticles - and show how it can be extended from 1/2 to nearby filling factors where the…
We present a theory of the isotropic-nematic quantum phase transition in the composite Fermi liquid arising in half-filled Landau levels. We show that the quantum phase transition between the isotropic and the nematic phase is triggered by an attractive quadrupolar interaction between electrons, as in the case of conventional Fermi liquids. We derive the theory of the nematic state and of the phase transition. This theory is based on the flux attachment procedure which maps an electron liquid in half-filled Landau levels into the composite Fermi liquid close to a nematic transition. We show th…
Phonon excitations of fractional quantum Hall states at filling factors nu = 1/3, 2/5, 4/7, 3/5, 4/3, and 5/3 are experimentally shown to be based on Landau level transitions of Composite Fermions. At filling factor nu = 2/3, however, a linear field dependence of the excitation energy in the high-field regime rather hints towards a spin transition excited by the phonons. We propose to explain this surprising observation by an only partially polarized 2/3-ground-state making the energetically lower lying spin transition also allowed for phonon excitations.
We discuss the possibility of the quantum Hall effect at half-filled Landau level in terms of the pairing of the composite fermions. In the absence of Coulomb energy, we show that the ground state of the system is described by the {\it p}-wave BCS pairing state of composite fermions. When the ratio $α\equiv (e^2/ε\ell_B)/ε_F$ ($\ell_B$ : the magnetic length, $ε_F$ : Fermi energy of the composite fermions) is larger than a critical value $α_c \sim 8.2$ the gap of the pairing state vanishes. However, $α$ remains less than $α_c$ if $\hbar ω_c \gg e^2/ε\ell_B$ holds. Then in this situation it is p…
By strictly adhering to the microscopic theory of composite fermions (CFs) for the Landau-level filling fractions ν_e = p/(2 p + 1), we reproduce, with remarkable accuracy, the surface-acoustic-wave (SAW)-based experimental results by Willett and co-workers concerning two-dimensional electron systems with ν_e close to 1/2. Our results imply that the electron band mass m_b, as distinct from the CF mass m_*, must undergo a substantial increase under the conditions corresponding to ν_e close to 1/2. We further establish that a finite mean-free path \ell_0 is essential for the observed linearity o…
We generalize the Landau levels of two-dimensional Dirac fermions to three dimensions and above with the full rotational symmetry. Similarly to the two-dimensional case, there exists a branch of zero energy Landau levels of fractional fermion modes for the massless Dirac fermions. The spectra of other Landau levels distribute symmetrically with respect to the zero energy scaling with the square root of the Landau-level indices. This mechanism is a nonminimal coupling of Dirac fermions to the background fields. This high dimensional relativistic Landau-level problem is a square-root problem of …
Dujavne et al suggest that the observed spectra are a result of spin-split Landau levels and spin-flip energies reveal composite fermion interactions. We find that the CF effective field formula is incorrect. In fact, CF model is independent of spin so that the interpretations of data by Dujovne et al in terms of CF model are incorrect. It may be pointed out that the experimental mass of the quasiparticles is several orders of magnitude smaller than the CF mass.
Via measurements of commensurability features near Landau filling factor $ν=1/2$, we probe the shape of the Fermi contour for hole-flux composite fermions confined to a wide GaAs quantum well. The data reveal that the composite fermions are strongly influenced by the characteristics of the Landau level in which they are formed. In particular, their Fermi contour is $\textit{warped}$ when their Landau level originates from a hole band with significant warping.
A composite Fermion hierarchy theory is constructed in a way related to the original Haldane picture by applying the composite Fermion (CF) transformation to quasiparticles of Jain states. It is shown that the Jain theory coincides with the Haldane hierarchy theory for principal CF fillings. Within the Fermi liquid approach for few electron systems on the sphere a simple interpretation of many-quasiparticle spectra is given and provides an explanation of failure of CF hierarchy picture when applied to the hierarchical $4/11$ state.
The ground state cohesive energies per electron of the composite fermion (CF) Fermi sea, the Laughlin state and the charge density wave (CDW) at higher Landau levels (LLs) are computed. It is shown that whereas for $n\geq 2$ LL, the CDW state is generally more energetically preferable than those of the CF liquid and the Laughlin liquid, the $ν=4+1/6$ CF liquid state unexpectedly has lower ground state energy than that of the CDW state. We suggest this CF liquid between the Wigner crystal and the bubble phase may lead to the crossover from the normal integer quantum Hall liquid to the novel re-…
We review the recently proposed Dirac composite fermion theory of the half-filled Landau level. This paper is based on a talk given at the Nambu Symposium at University of Chicago, March 11-13, 2016.
Composite fermions in fractional quantum Hall (FQH) systems are believed to form a Fermi sea of weakly interacting particles at half filling $ν=1/2$. Recently, it was proposed (D. T. Son, Phys. Rev. X 5, 031027 (2015)) that these composite fermions are Dirac particles. In our work, we demonstrate experimentally that composite fermions found in monolayer graphene are Dirac particles at half filling. Our experiments have addressed FQH states in high-mobility, suspended graphene Corbino disks in the vicinity of $ν=1/2$. We find strong temperature dependence of conductivity $σ$ away from half fill…
We obtain the exact spectrum and the unique ground state of two composite fermions (in a Rajaraman - Sondhi like formulation) in an external magnetic field $B$. We show that the energy eigenvalues decrease with increasing angular momentum, thus making it energetically favourable for composite fermions to stay apart. Generalising this result to a gas of composite fermions, we provide an energetic justification of the Laughlin and Jain wave-functions.
Much of the present day qualitative phenomenology of the fractional quantum Hall effect can be understood by neglecting the interactions between composite fermions altogether. For example the fractional quantum Hall effect at $ν=n/(2pn\pm 1)$ corresponds to filled composite-fermion Landau levels,and the compressible state at $ν=1/2p$ to the Fermi sea of composite fermions. Away from these filling factors, the residual interactions between composite fermions will determine the nature of the ground state. In this article, a model is constructed for the residual interaction between composite ferm…
One of the most spectacular experimental findings in the fractional quantum Hall effect is evidence for an emergent Fermi surface when the electron density is nearly half the density of magnetic flux quanta ($ν= 1/2$). The seminal work of Halperin, Lee, and Read (HLR) first predicted that at $ν= 1/2$ composite fermions--bound states of an electron and a pair of vortices--experience zero net magnetic field and can form a "composite Fermi liquid" with an emergent Fermi surface. In this paper we use infinite cylinder DMRG to provide compelling numerical evidence for the existence of a Fermi sea o…
We show that the imaginary vector potential causes a pair-breaking effect in the composite fermion theory, and discuss its irrelevance in the pairing state. The Hamiltonian for pairing states of composite fermions is proposed. The advantage of non-unitary transformations and the meaning of the non-Hermitian term are discussed.
