Hydrodynamic Coulomb drag of strongly correlated electron liquids

We develop a theory of Coulomb drag in ultraclean double layers with strongly correlated carriers. In the regime where the equilibration length of the electron liquid is shorter than the interlayer spacing the main contribution to the Coulomb drag arises from hydrodynamic density fluctuations. The latter consist of plasmons driven by fluctuating longitudinal stresses, and diffusive modes caused by temperature fluctuations and thermal expansion of the electron liquid. We express the drag resistivity in terms of the kinetic coefficients of the electron fluid. Our results are nonperturbative in interaction strength and do not assume Fermi-liquid behavior of the electron liquid.

Figure 1

Dimensionless functions ${\mathcal{F}}_1$ (bottom line) and ${\mathcal{F}}_2$ (top line) that enter the drag resistivity are plotted versus their respective scaling variables $z=\alpha$ and $z=\beta$ [see Eqs. (15, 16, 17, 18) for the definition].