Quantized conductance and intersubband scattering in serially connected quantum wires

We studied the conductance of quantum wires (QWRs) with rigid confinement p otential in different configurations, including single QWRs, QWRs with rest ricted access to the 2D reservoirs, and serially connected QWRs. We explain the deviations of quantized conductance values from 2e(2)/h as coming from the lack of 1D/2D coupling. The role of intersubband scattering in establi shing contact between the QWR and 2D reservoirs is demonstrated. The achiev ement of conductance step values lose to 2e(2)/h in these wires depends on establishing strong intersubband scattering without significant backscatter ing.