Chargeless heat transport in the fractional quantum Hall regime

C. Altimiras, H. le Sueur, U. Gennser, A. Anthore, A. Cavanna, D. Mailly, F. Pierre

Published 2012-02-28, updated 2012-07-04Version 2

We demonstrate a direct approach to investigate heat transport in the fractional quantum Hall regime. At filling factor of 4/3, we inject power at quantum point contacts and detect the related heating from the activated current through a quantum dot. The experiment reveals a chargeless heat transport from a significant heating that occurs upstream of the power injection point, in the absence of a concomitant electrical current. By tuning in-situ the edge path, we show that the chargeless heat transport does not follow the reverse direction of the electrical current path along the edge. This unexpected heat conduction demonstrates a novel aspect, yet to be elucidated, of the physics in fractional quantum Hall systems.