Acoustoelectric current in graphene due to electron deformation potential and piezoelectric phonon couplings

TL;DR

This paper investigates the acoustoelectric current in graphene caused by electron-phonon interactions, providing detailed numerical and analytical analysis that aligns well with experimental findings, advancing understanding of graphene's potential in acoustic-electronic applications.

Contribution

It offers a comprehensive numerical and analytical study of acoustoelectric current in graphene considering both piezoelectric and deformation potential couplings, surpassing previous simplified models.

Findings

Analytical results agree with experimental data

Both piezoelectric and deformation potential couplings are significant

Numerical and analytical methods complement each other

Abstract

Recent studies strongly indicate that graphene can be used as a channel material for converting surface acoustic waves to acoustoelectric current, which is a resource for various exciting technological applications. On the theoretical side, studies on phonon amplification/attenuation and acoustoelectric current at low temperatures in graphene have reported approximate analytical results under exceedingly simplifying conditions using the Boltzmann transport equation. Overcoming the earlier simplifying assumptions, we investigate both numerically and analytically the governing kinetic equations for amplification/attenuation and acoustoelectric current, taking into account the piezoelectric and deformation potential electron phonon coupling mechanism in the semi classical Boltzmann transport formalism approach, and obtain analytical results that are in reasonable agreement with the reported experimental results.