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Published on: June 9, 2023
h/e oscillations in interlayer transport of delafossites
Carsten Putzke1, Maja D Bachmann2,3, Philippa McGuinness2,3
1Laboratory of Quantum Materials (QMAT), Institute of Materials, École Polytechnique Fédéral de Lausanne (EPFL), 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland. carsten.putzke@epfl.ch andy.mackenzie@cpfs.mpg.de philip.moll@epfl.ch.
Abstract:
Microstructures can be carefully designed to reveal the quantum phase of the wave-like nature of electrons in a metal. Here, we report phase-coherent oscillations of out-of-plane magnetoresistance in the layered delafossites PdCoO2 and PtCoO2 The oscillation period is equivalent to that determined by the magnetic flux quantum, h/e, threading an area defined by the atomic interlayer separation and the sample width, where h is Planck's constant and e is the charge of an electron. The phase of the electron wave function appears robust over length scales exceeding 10 micrometers and persisting up to temperatures of T > 50 kelvin. We show that the experimental signal stems from a periodic field modulation of the out-of-plane hopping. These results demonstrate extraordinary single-particle quantum coherence lengths in delafossites.
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