Inelastic Coulomb scattering rates due to acoustic and optical plasmon modes in coupled quantum wires

TL;DR

This paper presents a theoretical analysis of inelastic Coulomb scattering in coupled quantum wires, highlighting the roles of optical and acoustic plasmon modes and the impact of tunneling on scattering rates.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed theoretical model for Coulomb scattering in coupled quantum wires, emphasizing the influence of plasmon modes and tunneling effects.

Findings

Two peaks in scattering spectrum due to optical and acoustic plasmons.

Optical plasmon scattering rate similar to single wire case.

Weak tunneling significantly affects acoustic plasmon scattering.

Abstract

We report a theoretical study on the inelastic Coulomb scattering rate of an injected electron in two coupled quantum wires in quasi-one-dimensional doped semiconductors. Two peaks appear in the scattering spectrum due to the optical and the acoustic plasmon scattering in the system. We find that the scattering rate due to the optical plasmon mode is similar to that in a single wire but the acoustic plasmon scattering depends crucially on its dispersion relation at small $q$. Furthermore, the effects of tunneling between the two wires are studied on the inelastic Coulomb scattering rate. We show that a weak tunneling can strongly affect the acoustic plasmon scattering.