Phonon-thermoelectric transistors and rectifiers

TL;DR

This paper introduces nonlinear phonon-thermoelectric devices, including transistors and rectifiers, based on inelastic electron-phonon interactions in quantum-dot systems, enabling control of charge and heat currents with potential for practical applications.

Contribution

It presents a novel design for thermoelectric devices utilizing inelastic phonon-assisted processes in quantum dots, achievable with current nanotechnology.

Findings

Pronounced charge, heat, and cross rectification effects observed.

Thermal transistor effect demonstrated in linear-response regime.

Device operation does not require negative differential thermal conductance.

Abstract

We describe nonlinear phonon-thermoelectric devices where charge current and electronic and phononic heat currents are coupled, driven by voltage and temperature biases, when phonon-assisted inelastic processes dominate the transport. Our thermoelectric transistors and rectifiers can be realized in a gate-tunable double quantum-dot system embedded in a nanowire which is realizable within current technology. The inelastic electron-phonon scattering processes are found to induce pronounced charge, heat, and cross rectification effects, as well as a thermal transistor effect that, remarkably, can appear in the present model even in the linear-response regime without relying on negative differential thermal conductance.