Magnetoplasmons in high electron mobility CdTe/CdMgTe quantum wells

Abstract

Terahertz magnetospectroscopy experiments on high quality CdTe/CdMgTe quantum wells were carried out at low temperatures and high magnetic fields. Samples of two different geometries were considered: a large-area grid-gated sample and a split-gate quantum point contact (QPC). The spectra show features originating from a cyclotron resonance transition and magnetoplasmon excitations. Depending on the sample geometry, plasmons characterized by an effective dielectric function of a mixed gated/ungated (in grid-gated samples) or ungated type (in the QPC) were excited. In each case, the resulting plasmon dispersion relation was determined and we show that it can be precisely described within a theory based on a local approximation of a high-frequency magnetoconductivity tensor of a two-dimensional electron gas by taking into account a polaron effect and plasmon-longitudinal optical (LO) phonon interaction.