Department of Physics
Condensed Matter Seminar

We discuss new states of matter emerging from the study of low dimensional and condined helium at low millikelvin temperatures, which may contribute to the understanding of more complex strongly correlated fermions, including unconventional superconductors. Helium films adsorbed onto graphite provide clean atomically layered systems in which the atoms are subject to a lattice potential. Studies of 3He monolayers allow us to explore the properties of 2DFermi liquid and 2D Mott transition and recent data of 3He bilayers haverevealed a new heavy fermion state. In a separate torsional oscillator experiment on 4He films we find a putative 2D supersolid state. The ability to perform high precision measurements on such films in well chacterized confined geometries opens the way for a wide range of further studies, including the investigation of possible new quasi-2D superfluidity states in narrow slabs.