APPLICATION OF THE QUANTUM HALL-EFFECT IN METROLOGY

The quantum Hall effect (QHE) is a phenomenon visible in Hall effect measurements on a two-dimensional electron gas in strong magnetic fields and at low temperatures. The experimental results on such systems in the limit of zero temperature demonstrate that the Hall resistance R//H as a function of the magnetic field B shows plateaux with plateau values which are, within the experimental uncertainty, independent of the material, the geometry of the device, and other parameters. For an ideal system R//H depends exclusively on fundamental constants, but for real experiments corrections may be necessary which are important, if the QHE is applied in metrology.