Conductance of the single-electron transistor: A comparison of experimental data with Monte Carlo calculations

We report on experimental results for the conductance of metallic single-electron transistors as a function of temperature, gate voltage, and dimensionless conductance. In contrast to previous experiments our transistor layout allows for a direct measurement of the parallel conductance and no ad hoc assumptions on the symmetry of the transistors are necessary. Thus we can make a comparison between our data and theoretical predictions without any adjustable parameter. Even for rather weakly conducting transistors significant deviations from the perturbative results are noted. On the other hand, path-integral Monte Carlo calculations show remarkable agreement with experiments for the whole range of temperatures and conductances.