Classical Memory Effects Research Articles

Memory Effects in the Magnetoresistance of Two-Component Electron Systems

The theory of the magnetotransport in a two-component electron system with rare macroscopic defects has been developed. In such a system, the classical memory effects in the scattering of electrons by defects and a slow transfer of electrons between the components of the liquid occurring due to the electron–electron scattering play a decisive role. It has been shown that the flow regime depends on the ratio of the sample width to the characteristic internal length, which is determined by the rate of electron transfer between the components. In samples wider than the internal length, the flow of the two-component liquid as a whole is formed within the bulk of the sample and is described by the corresponding Drude formulas taking into account memory effects. In this case, the magnetoresistance is positive at low magnetic fields and negative at high fields. In samples narrower than the characteristic length, the transfers involving a change in the type of electrons do not provide enough time to form a unified liquid. As a result, the flows of different components are independent and described by their own conductivities, taking into account the memory effects, while the magnetoresistance is strictly negative.

Effect of background scattering on the magnetoconductance of two-dimensional Lorentz gases

The magnetotransport of two-dimensional Lorentz gases is studied in the presence of two types of additional disorder. We observe that at small magnetic fields, dynamic background potentials cause an increase of the conductivity, while it decreases in response to static background potentials, implemented by a secondary Lorentz gas with large mean free path. At intermediate and large magnetic fields, the effect of the additional disorder is independent of its character but changes sign at a threshold magnetic field. The observed phenomenology is interpreted in terms of the influence the background scattering exerts on classical memory effects, in particular on retroreflection, transient superdiffusive motion and drift along the edges of obstacle clusters.

Microwave-Induced Resistance Oscillations as a Classical Memory Effect.

By numerical simulations and analytical studies, we show that the phenomenon of microwave-induced resistance oscillations can be understood as a classical memory effect caused by recollisions of electrons with scattering centers after a cyclotron period. We develop a Drude-like approach to magnetotransport in the presence of a microwave field, taking into account memory effects, and find an excellent agreement between numerical and analytical results, as well as a qualitative agreement with experiment.

Molecular mechanism leading to memory effect of mesomorphic isotactic polypropylene

ABSTRACTIn this study, memory effect of mesomorphic isotactic polypropylene (iPP) was investigated using polarized optical microscope and small‐angle X‐ray scattering. Differing from classical memory effect, mesomorphic iPP melt had a higher growth rate and a higher memory temperature. The relative growth rate increased with increasing crystallization temperature. Lauritzen–Hoffman plots indicated that the increased growth rate arose from reduced surface nucleation barrier. The highest memory temperature was estimated to be 185 °C, which was close to the equilibrium melting point of iPP crystal. Additionally, Small‐angle X‐ray scattering measurements showed that a liquid crystal layer might exist between lamellar and amorphous layers. Based on above results, a crystallization model was proposed. In the mesomorphic iPP melt, there exist aggregates structurally similar to β phase except α‐phase crystal residuals, which cannot act as nucleation sites or transform to β crystal through surface nucleation. The only way for the aggregate is to transform to α crystal during crystal growth. The aggregate decreases the surface nucleation barrier and promotes the helical growth, leading to higher growth rate. Only when the aggregate relaxes to polymer coils through thickening at a higher temperature, can the memory effect be erased. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Polym. Sci., Part B: Polym. Phys. 2016, 54, 1573–1580

Collapse and revival of quantum coherence for a harmonic oscillator interacting with a classical fluctuating environment

We address the dynamics of nonclassicality for a quantum system interacting with a noisy fluctuating environment described by a classical stochastic field. As a paradigmatic example, we consider a harmonic oscillator initially prepared in a maximally nonclassical state, e.g. a Fock number state or a Schroedinger cat-like state, and then coupled to either resonant or non-resonant external field. Stochastic modeling allows us to describe the decoherence dynamics without resorting to approximated quantum master equations, and to introduce non- Markovian effects in a controlled way. A detailed comparison among different nonclassicality criteria and a thorough analysis of the decoherence time reveal a rich phenomenology whose main features may be summarized as follows: i) classical memory effects increase the survival time of quantum coherence; ii) a detuning between the natural frequency of the system and the central frequency of the classical field induces revivals of quantum coherence.

Nonlinear transport in two-dimensional electron gas exhibiting colossal negative magnetoresistance

We report on nonlinear transport measurements in a GaAs/AlGaAs quantum well exhibiting a colossal negative magnetoresistance effect. Under applied dc bias, the magnetoresistance becomes nonmonotonic, exhibiting distinct extrema that move to higher magnetic fields with increasing current. In the range of magnetic fields corresponding to the resistivity minimum at zero bias, the resistivity increases linearly with current and the rate of this increase scales with the inverse magnetic field. The latter observation is consistent with the theory, proposed more than 35 years ago, considering classical memory effects in the presence of strong, dilute scatterers.

Memory consolidation from seconds to weeks: a three-stage neural network model with autonomous reinstatement dynamics.

Declarative long-term memories are not created in an instant. Gradual stabilization and temporally shifting dependence of acquired declarative memories in different brain regions—called systems consolidation—can be tracked in time by lesion experiments. The observation of temporally graded retrograde amnesia (RA) following hippocampal lesions points to a gradual transfer of memory from hippocampus to neocortical long-term memory. Spontaneous reactivations of hippocampal memories, as observed in place cell reactivations during slow-wave-sleep, are supposed to drive neocortical reinstatements and facilitate this process. We propose a functional neural network implementation of these ideas and furthermore suggest an extended three-state framework that includes the prefrontal cortex (PFC). It bridges the temporal chasm between working memory percepts on the scale of seconds and consolidated long-term memory on the scale of weeks or months. We show that our three-stage model can autonomously produce the necessary stochastic reactivation dynamics for successful episodic memory consolidation. The resulting learning system is shown to exhibit classical memory effects seen in experimental studies, such as retrograde and anterograde amnesia (AA) after simulated hippocampal lesioning; furthermore the model reproduces peculiar biological findings on memory modulation, such as retrograde facilitation of memory after suppressed acquisition of new long-term memories—similar to the effects of benzodiazepines on memory.

Entanglement reactivation in separable environments

Combining two entanglement-breaking channels into a correlated-noise environment restores the distribution of entanglement. Surprisingly, this reactivation can be induced by the injection of separable correlations from the composite environment. In any dimension (finite or infinite), we can construct classically correlated ‘twirling’ environments which are entanglement-breaking in the transmission of single systems but entanglement-preserving when two systems are transmitted. Here entanglement is simply preserved by the existence of decoherence-free subspaces. Remarkably, even when such subspaces do not exist, a fraction of the input entanglement can still be distributed. This is found in separable Gaussian environments, where distillable entanglement is able to survive the two-mode transmission, despite being broken in any single-mode transmission by the strong thermal noise. In the Gaussian setting, entanglement restoration is a threshold process, occurring only after a critical amount of correlations has been injected. Such findings suggest new perspectives for distributing entanglement in realistic environments with extreme decoherence, identifying separable correlations and classical memory effects as physical resources for ‘breaking entanglement-breaking’.

Magnetotransport in a 2D system with strong scatterers: Renormalization of Hall coefficient caused by non-Markovian effects

We show that a sharp dependence of the Hall coefficient R on the magnetic field B arises in two-dimensional electron systems with strong scatterers. The phenomenon is due to classical memory effects. We calculate analytically the dependence of R on B for the case of scattering by antidots (modeled by hard disks of radius a), randomly distributed with concentration n 0 ≪ 1/a 2. We demonstrate that in very weak magnetic fields (ω c τtr ≲ n 0 a 2), memory effects lead to a considerable renormalization of the Boltzmann value of the Hall coefficient: δR/R ∼ 1. With increasing magnetic field, the relative correction to R decreases, then changes sign, and saturates at the value δR/R ∼ −n 0 a 2. We also discuss the effect of the smooth disorder on the dependence of R on B.

Sharp magnetic field dependence of the two-dimensional Hall coefficient induced by classical memory effects

We show that a sharp dependence of the Hall coefficient $R$ on the magnetic field $B$ arises in two-dimensional electron systems with randomly located strong scatterers. The phenomenon is due to classical memory effects. We calculate analytically the dependence $R(B)$ for the case of scattering by hard disks of radius $a$, randomly distributed with concentration $n_0\ll1/a^2$. We demonstrate that in very weak magnetic fields ($\omega_c\tau \lesssim n_0a^2$) memory effects lead to a considerable renormalization of the Boltzmann value of the Hall coefficient: $\delta R / R \sim 1 .$ With increasing magnetic field, the relative correction to $R$ decreases, then changes sign, and saturates at the value $\delta R / R \sim -n_0a^2 .$ We also discuss the effect of the smooth disorder on the dependence of $R$ on $B$.

Classical memory effects on spin dynamics in two-dimensional systems

We discuss classical dynamics of electron spin in two-dimensional semiconductors with a spin-split spectrum. We focus on a special case, when spin-orbit induced random magnetic field is directed along a fixed axis. This case is realized in III-V-based quantum wells grown in [110] direction and also in [100]-grown quantum wells with equal strength of Dresselhaus and Bychkov-Rashba spin-orbit couplings. We show that in such wells the long-time spin dynamics is determined by non-Markovian memory effects. Due to these effects the non-exponential tail $1/t^2$ appears in the spin polarization.