Briggeman Megan, Mansfield Elliott, Kombe Johannes, Damanet François, Lee Hyungwoo, Tang Yuhe, Yu Muqing, Biswas Sayanwita, Li Jianan, Huang Mengchen, Eom Chang-Beom, Irvin Patrick, Daley Andrew J, Levy Jeremy
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260, USA.
Pittsburgh Quantum Institute, Pittsburgh, PA 15260, USA.
Sci Adv. 2025 Jun 13;11(24):eadx4761. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adx4761.
The origin and function of chirality in DNA, proteins, and other building blocks of life represent a central question in biology. Observations of spin polarization and magnetization associated with electron transport through chiral molecules, known collectively as the chiral induced spin selectivity effect, suggest that chirality improves electron transfer. Using reconfigurable nanoscale control over conductivity at the LaAlO/SrTiO interface, we create chiral electron potentials that explicitly lack mirror symmetry. Quantum transport measurements on these chiral nanowires reveal enhanced electron pairing persisting to high magnetic fields (up to 18 tesla) and oscillatory transmission resonances as functions of both magnetic field and chemical potential. We interpret these resonances as arising from an engineered axial spin-orbit interaction within the chiral region. The ability to create one-dimensional electron waveguides with this specificity creates opportunities to test, via analog quantum simulation, theories about chirality and spin-polarized electron transport in one-dimensional geometries.
DNA、蛋白质及其他生命组成部分中手性的起源和功能是生物学中的核心问题。对与通过手性分子进行电子传输相关的自旋极化和磁化的观察，统称为手性诱导自旋选择性效应，表明手性可改善电子转移。利用对LaAlO/SrTiO界面处电导率的可重构纳米级控制，我们创建了明显缺乏镜面对称性的手性电子势。对这些手性纳米线的量子输运测量揭示了增强的电子配对，这种配对在高磁场（高达18特斯拉）下依然存在，并且作为磁场和化学势的函数呈现出振荡传输共振。我们将这些共振解释为源自手性区域内设计的轴向自旋-轨道相互作用。以这种特异性创建一维电子波导的能力，为通过模拟量子模拟来测试关于一维几何结构中手性和自旋极化电子输运的理论创造了机会。
