Energy relaxation in graphene and its measurement with supercurrent

Abstract

We study inelastic energy relaxation in graphene for low energies to find out how electrons scatter with acoustic phonons and other electrons. By coupling the graphene to superconductors, we create a strong dependence of the measured signal, i.e., critical Josephson current, on the electron population on different energy states. Since the relative population of high- and low-energy states is determined by the inelastic scattering processes, the critical current becomes an effective probe for their strength. We argue that the electron-electron interaction is the dominant relaxation method and we estimate a scattering time τe−e=0.1…1 ps at T=500 mK, 1-2 orders of magnitude smaller than predicted for normal two-dimensional diffusive systems.