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Energy Relaxation Time of Electrons in Quantum Dots
Author(s) -
Ezaki T.,
Mori N.,
Hamaguchi C.
Publication year - 1997
Publication title -
physica status solidi (b)
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.51
H-Index - 109
eISSN - 1521-3951
pISSN - 0370-1972
DOI - 10.1002/1521-3951(199711)204:1<272::aid-pssb272>3.0.co;2-z
Subject(s) - electron , relaxation (psychology) , condensed matter physics , physics , quantum dot , fermi energy , coulomb , atomic physics , quantum , phonon , quantum mechanics , psychology , social psychology
The energy relaxation time due to electron–longitudinal‐acoustic phonon interaction is calculated for a GaAs quantum dot with N electrons (from N = 1 to 3), where the electrons in a narrow quantum well are confined by a parabolic confining potential. The electronic states are numerically evaluated by taking into account the Coulomb interaction between the electrons, and the relaxation time is estimated by using Fermi's golden rule. As the number of electrons increases, the energy levels become dense, and the number of relaxation channels drastically increases. From the evaluation of the relaxation time associated with all the relaxation channels, several relaxation processes are found to be accelerated by a certain process through some intermediate states between the initial and the final states. The effect of change in the quantum well width is also discussed.