Ballistic hole transport in a quantum wire

We report ballistic hole conduction in 2 mu m long GaAs quantum wires of nominal cross-section 15 nm by 15 nm. In each of eight test wires, we observe several quantized conduction steps of approximate height 0.77 e(2)/h. The wires were fabricated using the cleaved edge overgrowth molecular-beam epitaxy process, and the modulation-doped acceptors were incorporated using a carbon filament as the source of atomic carbon. (C) 2005 American Institute of Physics.