RKKY interaction and the nature of the ground state of double dots in parallel

We argue through a combination of slave-boson mean-field theory and the Bethe ansatz that the ground state of closely spaced double quantum dots in parallel coupled to a single effective channel are Fermi liquids. We do so by studying the dots' conductance, impurity entropy, and spin correlation. In particular, we find that the zero-temperature conductance is characterized by the Friedel sum rule, a hallmark of Fermi-liquid physics, and that the impurity entropy vanishes in the limit of zero temperature, indicating that the ground state is a singlet. This conclusion is in opposition to a number of numerical renormalization-group studies. We suggest a possible reason for the discrepancy.