Fluctuational Instabilities of Alkali and Noble Metal Nanowires
نویسنده
چکیده
We introduce a continuum approach to studying the lifetimes of monovalent metal nanowires. By modelling the thermal fluctuations of cylindrical nanowires through the use of stochastic Ginzburg-Landau classical field theories, we construct a self-consistent approach to the fluctuation-induced “necking” of nanowires. Our theory provides quantitative estimates of the lifetimes for alkali metal nanowires in the conductance range 10 < G/G0 < 100 (where G0 = 2e /h is the conductance quantum), and allows us to account for qualitative differences in the conductance histograms of alkali vs. noble metal nanowires.
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