Modeling the Two-Dimensional Electron Gas in Solid State Devices

Electrons confined in solid state devices of various kinds display very peculiar properties that continue to attract the attention of experimental, theoretical and computational physicists alike. I shall discuss recent progress in the modeling of two-dimensional electron systems of exceedingly high mobility, as realized in quantum wells and field-effect transistors, concentrating on the spin susceptibility at densities close to an observed metal-to-insulator transition. I shall demonstrate that the two-dimensional electron gas model is perfectly capable of describing the available experimental evidence, once it is augmented with important device details, a crucial one being disorder scattering. I shall also argue that an extremely accurate treatment of the model is necessary, the only appropriate technique to date being provided by the Quantum Monte Carlo method