Single-electron tunneling in metal droplets in the high conductance regime- art. no. 195405

We present single-electron tunneling results for well-characterized multidr oplet systems in the high conductance regime. The work was conducted with t unnel systems comprising ultra-small Ni droplets. The conductance associate d with individual droplets was estimated to reach 18-19 G(K) in systems exh ibiting especially high conductance. The P(E) (phase correlation) theory ha s been successfully applied to the conductance characteristics of these sys tems. Our results suggest that in the high conductance regime the droplets can be modeled as single, resistively isolated tunnel junctions. Based on a n analysis of the single-electron properties of these systems, the average number of droplets N contributing to the total tunneling conductance can be estimated. For samples in the low conductance regime. it appears that N=1, whereas for samples in the high conductance regime 100<N<1000.