Magnetic impurity effect in atomic sized conductor

We have studied the electrical conductance in Au nanowire containing 0.07 at.% Fe ions and Cu nanowire containing 13 at.% Mn ions with mechanically controllable break junction technique to investigate the magnetic impurity effects in the atomic-sized conductance. We observe not only conductance steps at the integer multiples of G₀ = 2e²/h, but also steps deviating from them. The scattering between the conduction electrons and impurity ions lifts the spin degeneracy of the transmission probability, which may be responsible for the deviation.