Thermal ionization of impurity-bound quasiholes in the fractional quantum Hall effect
Phys. Rev. B 114, 194204 – Published 16 October, 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/8tjc-cwv1
Abstract
We study the interplay between a Coulomb impurity and quasiholes in a fractional quantum Hall (FQH) state at finite temperatures. While a repulsive impurity can pin a quasihole and stabilize the FQH state, an attractive impurity cannot bind quasiholes. We demonstrate that at finite temperatures, a quasihole can be thermally ionized from a repulsive impurity, resulting in a thermal ionization crossover. We propose an experimental setup using exciton sensing to detect such a thermal ionization of quasiholes.
