# Realistic model of correlated disorder and Anderson localization

## Abstract

A conducting 1D chain or 2D film inside (or on the surface of) an insulator is considered. Impurities displace the charges inside the insulator. This results in a long-range fluctuating electric field acting on the conducting line (plane). This field can be modeled by that of randomly distributed electric dipoles. This model provides a random correlated potential with $`U(r)U(r+k)1/k`$. In the 1D case such correlations may essentially influence the localization length but do not destroy Anderson localization.

It was recently stated in  that some special correlations in a random potential can produce a mobility edge (between localized and delocalized states) inside the allowed band in the 1D tight-binding model. In principle, extrapolation of this result to 2D systems may give a possible explanation of the insulator-conductor transition in dilute 2D electron systems observed in ref. . In such a situation it is very important to build a reasonable model of “correlated disorder” in real systems and calculate the effects of this “real” disorder.

Usually, a 1D or 2D conductor is made inside or on the surface of an insulating material. Impurities inside the insulator displace the electric charges. However, a naive “random charge” model violates electro-neutrality and gives wrong results. Indeed, the impurities do not produce new charges, they only displace charges thus forming electric dipoles. Therefore, we consider a model of randomly distributed electric dipoles (alternatively, one can consider a spin glass model which gives the correlated random magnetic field). The dipoles have long-range electric field. Therefore, the potentials at different sites turn out to be correlated.

The system of the dipoles $`d_j`$ produces the potential

$$U(r)=e\underset{j}{}𝐝_𝐣\frac{1}{|𝐫𝐑_𝐣|}.$$
(1)   
The average value of this potential is zero if $`𝐝_j=0`$, when the correlator of the potentials at the points $`𝐫_\mathrm{𝟏}`$ and $`𝐫_\mathrm{𝟐}`$ is equal to

$$U(𝐫_\mathrm{𝟏})U(𝐫_\mathrm{𝟐})=e^2\underset{i,j}{}<𝐝_𝐢\frac{1}{|𝐫_\mathrm{𝟏}𝐑_𝐢|}𝐝_𝐣\frac{1}{|𝐫_\mathrm{𝟐}𝐑_𝐣|}>=\frac{e^2𝐝^\mathrm{𝟐}}{3}\underset{j}{}\left(\frac{1}{|𝐫_\mathrm{𝟏}𝐑_𝐣|}\right)\left(\frac{1}{|𝐫_\mathrm{𝟐}𝐑_𝐣|}\right).$$
(2)   
Here we assumed that $`d_i^\alpha d_j^\beta =𝐝^2/3`$ $`\delta _{il}\delta _{\alpha \beta }`$ where $`\alpha `$ and $`\beta `$ are space indices. Let us further suggest that the dipoles are distributed in space with a constant density $`\rho `$. Then we have

$$U(𝐫_\mathrm{𝟏})U(𝐫_\mathrm{𝟐})=\frac{e^2𝐝^2\rho }{3}d^3R\left(\frac{1}{|𝐫_\mathrm{𝟏}𝐑|}\right)\left(\frac{1}{|𝐫_\mathrm{𝟐}𝐑|}\right)=\frac{4\pi e^2𝐝^2\rho }{3|𝐫_\mathrm{𝟏}𝐫_\mathrm{𝟐}|}.$$
(3)   
However, the fluctuations of the potential at a given site $`𝐫_\mathrm{𝟏}=𝐫_\mathrm{𝟐}`$ cannot be calculated in such a way since the expression (3) diverges. To remove this divergence, one has to take into account the geometrical size $`r_0`$ of the dipoles. Indeed, inside the radius $`r_0`$ the electric field is not described by the dipole formula and the real potential $`U(r)`$ does not contain the singularity $`1/r^2`$ which leads to the divergence. Obviously, only those dipoles, which are closer to the conducting chain than $`r_0`$, make the problem mentioned. One may eliminate them by putting the chain into an empty tube with the diameter $`d_0>2r_0`$. This method of cut-off is justified since a conducting wire always has finite diameter. The correlator (3) then reads on the chain oriented along the $`x`$ axis as

$$U(x_1)U(x_2)=\frac{e^2𝐝^2\rho }{3}\frac{1}{\sqrt{(x_1x_2)^2+d_0^2}}𝐄\left[\frac{(x_1x_2)^2}{(x_1x_2)^2+d_0^2}\right]$$
(4)   
where $`𝐄(m)`$ is the complete second kind elliptic integral with parameter $`m`$. This expression is everywhere finite and gives for the variance $`U^2=(2\pi ^2e^2𝐝^2\rho )/d_0`$ so that the normalized correlator is equal to

$$\xi (k)\frac{U(x)U(x+k)}{U^2}=\frac{2}{\pi }\frac{d_0}{\sqrt{k^2+d_0^2}}𝐄\left(\frac{k^2}{k^2+d_0^2}\right).$$
(5)   
This function is positively definite, equal to 1 at $`k=0`$ and decays inversely proportional to the distance $`|k|`$,

$$\xi (k)=\frac{2d_0}{\pi |k|},$$

when $`|k|d_0`$. Similar calculation in the case of a conducting film which is put in a split of the width $`2z_0`$ inside the insulator gives

$$\xi (𝐤)=\frac{\pi z_0}{|𝐤|}\left(1\frac{2}{\pi }\mathrm{arctan}\frac{2z_0}{|𝐤|}\right).$$
(6)   
In the Ref.  the inverse localization length for electron with an energy $`E`$, which moves in 1D random potential, has been expressed in terms of the trace of the Green function. Being applied to the discrete Schrödinger equation

$$\psi _{n+1}+\psi _{n1}=(E+ϵ_n)\psi _n$$
(7)   
with a weak potential $`ϵ_n`$, the Thouless’s formula looks in the second order approximation like

$$l^1(E)=\frac{1}{2N}\mathrm{Re}\mathrm{Tr}\left[G^{(0)}(E+i0)ϵG^{(0)}(E+i0)ϵ\right].$$
(8)   
Here $`N`$ is the number of sites, $`G^{(0)}(E)`$ is the unperturbed Green function of the equation (7), and $`ϵ`$ is the diagonal matrix of the random potential.

We employ spectral representation of the Green function $`G^{(0)}(E)`$

$$G_{n^{}n}^{(0)}=\frac{1}{N}\underset{q}{}\frac{e^{i\mu _q(nn^{})}}{EE_q}$$
(9)   
to calculate the trace in the r.h.s of eq. (8). Here

$$E_q=2\mathrm{cos}\mu _q;\mu _q=\frac{\pi }{N}q;N<q<N$$
(10)   
and the periodic boundary conditions are implied. Substitution in eq. (8) gives

$$l^1(E)=\underset{N\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{2N}\mathrm{Re}\underset{q,q^{}}{}\left[\frac{1}{N^2}\underset{n,n^{}}{}e^{i(\mu _q\mu _q^{})(nn^{})}ϵ_nϵ_n^{}\right]\frac{1}{(E+i0E_q^{})(E+i0E_q)}.$$
(11)   
In the limit $`N\mathrm{}`$ the summation over $`q`$ and $`q^{}`$ can be replaced by the integration over $`\mu _q`$ and $`\mu _q^{}`$. After the change of the variables $`p=\mu _q\mu _q^{},k=nn^{}`$ the integrals and one of the sums can be easily calculated. As a result, the inverse correlation length $`l^1(E)`$ at the energy $`E=2\mathrm{cos}\mu `$

$$l^1=\frac{ϵ_0^2}{8\mathrm{sin}^2\mu }\varphi (\mu )$$
(12)   
turns out to be proportional to the Fourier component

$$\varphi (\mu )=\underset{k=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}\xi (k)\mathrm{exp}(2i\mu k)=\underset{N\mathrm{}}{lim}\frac{1}{Nϵ_0^2}|\underset{n=\mathrm{}}{\overset{\mathrm{}}{}}ϵ_n\mathrm{exp}(2i\mu n)|^2$$
(13)   
of the normalized pair correlator $`\xi (k)=ϵ_nϵ_{n+k}/ϵ_0^2`$. One can see that the localization length is in essence the mean value of the squared “Fourier component” of the potential or in other words the mean free path for the backward scattering  (see also ) .

The Fourier transform of the correlator (5) can be calculated analytically in two limiting cases. If $`d_01`$ (in the units of lattice constant) the elliptic integral $`𝐄(1)=1`$ and

$$\varphi (\mu )=1\frac{4d_0}{\pi }\mathrm{ln}|2\mathrm{sin}\mu |.$$
(14)   
It is less than one in the part $`\sqrt{3}<E<\sqrt{3}`$ of the total energy band $`2<E=2\mathrm{cos}\mu <2`$ and is minimal, $`\varphi _{min}10.9d_0`$, at the center of the spectrum $`E=0,\mu =\pi /2`$. The quantity $`\varphi _{min}`$ reaches zero, which according to  would mean delocalization, when $`d_01.1`$. However, eq. (14) is not already entirely valid for such values of $`d_0`$ and further terms in the expansion over $`d_0`$ must be taken into account. In the opposite case of large $`d_0`$, transition to limit $`d_0\mathrm{}`$ may be for all $`\mu 0,\pi `$ taken before summing since the resulting sum is cut-off by oscillations. Consecutive summation gives then $`\varphi (\mu 0,\pi )=0`$.

For arbitrary finite values of $`d_0`$ Fourier components $`\varphi (\mu )`$ remain positive. However, they may be rather small within some energy interval. In Fig. 1 we show how $`\varphi (\pi /2)`$ decreases with $`d_0`$ growing. It is seen that at this point (and, obviously, in some vicinity of this point) $`\varphi (\mu )`$ becomes very small already for the values $`d_03`$ comparable with the lattice constant. In such a situation the deviations from the tight-binding model and higher order corrections in $`ϵ_n`$ may give important contributions and deserve a special consideration.

The realistic value of $`d_0`$ can hardly be much larger than the lattice constant. Actually, it is a typical minimal distance from impurities to the chain. Besides, any short-range fluctuations increase the variance $`ϵ_0^2`$ and reduce the normalized long-range correlator $`\xi (k)`$. Thus, we conclude that the “natural” correlations in random potential can hardly destroy Anderson localization in 1D case. However, these correlations can significantly influence the value of the localization length. It is well known that in 2D systems the localization length is very sensitive to parameters of the problem. Therefore, in the 2D case the correlations due to the long-range character of the dipole field may be even more important than in the 1D case.

Acknowledgments. V.V. Flambaum acknowledges the support from Australian Research Council. He is grateful to B. Altshuler, F. Izrailev and A. Krokhin for discussions and to V.Zelevinsky for valuable comments and hospitality during the stay in MSU Cyclotron laboratory when this work was done. V.V. Sokolov is indebted to V.F. Dmitriev, I.M. Izrailev and V.B. Telitsin for helpful discussions and advices.