Analysis of the phase lapse problem in closed interferometers

Abstract

We investigate the connection between the asymmetry of the Fano resonances in a mesoscopic interferometer with an embedded quantum dot and the π lapses in the phase of the bare dot transmittance. Consecutive Fano resonances with the same (opposite) sign of the Fano parameter imply the presence (absence) of a phase lapse with π between the corresponding resonances of the dot. Our results suggest that the famous phase lapse problem, first reported by Schuster et al. [R. Schuster, E. Buks, M. Heiblum, D. Mahalu, V. Umansky, H. Shtrikman, Nature 385 (1997) 417], can therefore be experimentally addressed in closed interferometers. It is also proposed that the Fano effect can be used to extract the phase distributions of the eigenfunctions for a mesoscopic 2D shape, via the parity of the resonances. In the presence of electron-electron interaction, one can calculate the phases of the T-matrix elements. The numerical results lead to the same conclusions as for the non-interacting case.