Full Counting Statistics of a charge shuttle

Abstract

We study the charge transfer in a small grain oscillating between two leads. Coulomb blockade restricts the charge fluctuations in such a way that only zero or one additional electrons can sit on the grain. The system thus acts as a charge shuttle. We obtain the full counting statistics of charge transfer and discuss its behavior. For large oscillation amplitude the probability of transferring $\tilde n$ electrons per cycle is strongly peaked around one. The peak is asymmetric since its form is controlled by different parameters for $\tilde n>1$ and $\tilde n < 1$. Under certain conditions the systems behaves as if the effective charge is 1/2 of the elementary one. Knowledge of the counting statistics gives a new insight on the mechanism of charge transfer.