Polarons and Solitons in Jahn-Teller Systems

TL;DR

This paper explores the properties of vector polarons and Jahn-Teller solitons in deformable molecular crystals using a semiclassical continuum model, providing analytical solutions and classifying different polaron types.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analytical framework for multicomponent polarons and identifies a new type of Jahn-Teller soliton stabilized by degeneracy.

Findings

Analytical solutions for two-band coupled vibrational modes

Classification of vector polarons by wavefunction features

Discovery of a long-lived Jahn-Teller soliton

Abstract

Using a semiclassical continuum model of an electron in a deformable molecular crystal, some properties of multicomponent generalizations of the polaron--``vector polarons''-- are elucidated. Analytical solutions for the case of two electronic bands coupled to two vibrational modes are given in detail. Within the model considered, the vector polaron can be classified by its wavefunction into several types and can have features that include: (1) a spatial variation in the electronic and vibrational character, and (2) low-energy internal degrees of freedom. For the case of electronic and vibrational degeneracy, local Jahn-Teller interactions can also lead to a novel spatiotemporal soliton, a long-lived excited state of the many-electron system stabilized by the conservation law resulting from degeneracy.