Metastable anisotropy orientation of nematic quantum Hall fluids
Abstract
We analyze the experimental observation of metastable anisotropy resistance orientation at half filled quantum Hall fluids by means of a model of a quantum nematic liquid in an explicit symmetry breaking potential. We interpret the observed ``rotation'' of the anisotropy axis as a process of nucleation of nematic domains and compute the nucleation rate within this model. By comparing with experiment, we are able to predict the critical radius of nematic bubbles, Rc 2.6 μ m . Each domain contains about 104 electrons.
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