Quantum Coherence in Low-Dimensional Interacting Fermi Systems

Abstract

Disorder versus interaction induced metal-insulator transitions are still a central problem in solid state physics. For non-interacting electrons in disordered systems [1] the scaling hypothesis of localization [2] successfully predicts many of the universal features of the transition from metallic to insulating behavior. However, the influence of the interaction on the transition is not equally well understood [3]; recent investigations of an apparent metal-insulator transition in two-dimensional systems even question the main assumptions of the scaling hypothesis [4]. Hereby, attention is also directed to randomly and periodically distorted one-dimensional systems. In one dimension, an infinitesimal amount of disorder (with backscattering contributions) leads to a localized ground state for non-interacting electrons, but with interaction [5] or for special realizations of the disorder [6, 7] this result may change.