Thermoelectric characteristics of ${\mathbb Z}_k$ parafermion Coulomb islands

Abstract

Using the explicit rational conformal field theory partition functions for the ${\mathbb Z}_k$ parafermion quantum Hall states on a disk we compute numerically the thermoelectric power factor for Coulomb-blockaded islands at finite temperature. We demonstrate that the power factor is rather sensitive to the neutral degrees of freedom and could eventually be used to distinguish experimentally between different quantum Hall states having identical electric properties. This might help us to confirm whether non-Abelian quasiparticles, such as the Fibonacci anyons, are indeed present in the experimentally observed quantum Hall states.