A Monte Carlo Study of the Low-Temperature Properties of Strongly Correlated Localized Particles in Disordered Systems

A computer simulation method is presented, which yields the ground state as well as the low-energy excitations for disordered systems of many interacting particles. The efficiency of the method is demonstrated by the application to the Coulomb glass, i.e. many localized electrons with long-range interaction. The obtained knowledge about the specific configurations of a large number of excited states is only the starting point for further investigations. First results are presented which shed a new light on old controversies about the behaviour of correlated electrons within the Coulomb gap regime.

Many localized electrons in disordered systems with Coulomb interaction: A simulation of the Coulomb glass

Monte Carlo simulation of correlated electrons in disordered systems

Abstract The properties of many-electron states in disordered systems with long-range electron-eletron interaction are investigated by means of a Monte Carlo simulation. Using the Metropolis algorithm, three-dimensional systems up to 512 sites are systematically analysed. The low-lying excitations are investigated in order to distinguish between one-particle and many-particle hopping. In the interesting regime in which disorder and correlation effects are equally important we find that variable-range hopping is insignificant for electron transfer when compared with the contribution from nearest-neighbour one-electron hopping processes as well as variable-number hopping.