Surface photocurrent in an electron gas over liquid He subjected to a quantizing magnetic field

Abstract

The photogalvanic effect is studied in electron gas over the liquid He surface with the presence of quantizing magnetic field. The gas is affected by the weak alternating microwave electric field tilted towards the surface normal. Both linear and circular photogalvanic effects are studied. The current occurs via indirect phototransition with the participation of ripplons emission or absorption. The photogalvanic tensor has strong resonances at the microwave frequency ω approaching to the frequencies of transitions between size-quantized subbands. The resonances are symmetric or antisymmetric, depending on a tensor component. Other resonances appear at ω ≈ nω _c , where n being integer and ω _c is the cyclotron frequency. It is found that the latter resonances split to two peaks connected with emission or absorption of ripplons. The calculated photogalvanic coefficients are in accord with the experimental observed values.