Eur. Phys. J. B 82, 63-67 (2011)
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2011-20202-3

Wigner crystal in snaked nanochannels

¹ Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics, 630090 Novosibirsk, Russia
² Laboratoire de Physique Théorique du CNRS (IRSAMC), Université de Toulouse, UPS, 31062 Toulouse, France

Corresponding author: ^a dima@irsamc.ups-tlse.fr

Received: 15 March 2011
Revised: 1 May 2011
Published online: 29 June 2011

Abstract

We study the properties of a Wigner crystal in snaked nanochannels and show that they are characterized by a conducting sliding phase at low charge densities and an insulating pinned phase above a critical charge density. The transition between these phases has a devil's staircase structure typical for the Aubry transition in dynamical maps and the Frenkel-Kontorova model. We discuss the implications of this phenomenon for charge density waves in quasi-one-dimensional organic conductors and for supercapacitors in nanopore materials.