Signature of ballistic effects in disordered conductors - art. no. 241101

Statistical properties of energy levels, wave functions, and quantum-mechan ical matrix elements in disordered conductors are usually calculated assumi ng diffusive electron dynamics. Mirlin has pointed out [Phys. Rep. 326, 259 (2000)] that ballistic effects may, under certain circumstances, dominate diffusive contributions. We study the influence of such ballistic effects o n the statistical properties of wave functions in quasi-one-dimensional dis ordered conductors. Our results support the view that ballistic effects--on length scales much smaller than the mean free path-can be significant in t hese systems.