Aharonov-Bohm effect as a probe of interaction between magnetic impurities

Victor Galitski, M. G. Vavilov, L. I. Glazman

Published 2004-06-30Version 1

We study the effects of the RKKY interaction between magnetic impurities on the mesoscopic conductance fluctuations of a metal ring with dilute magnetic impurities. At sufficiently low temperatures and strong magnetic fields, the loss of electron coherence occurs mainly due to the scattering off rare pairs of strongly coupled magnetic impurities. We establish a relation between the dephasing rate and the distribution function of the exchange interaction within such pairs. In the case of the RKKY exchange interaction, this rate exhibits 1/B^2 behavior in strong magnetic fields. We demonstrate that the Aharonov-Bohm conductance oscillations may be used as a probe of the distribution function of the exchange interaction between magnetic impurities in metals.