Abstract:
The irreversible transfer of the electric charge between zero-dimensional nanostructures is an important phenomenon in the systems like e.g. interacting quantum dots and molecules, and even within DNA molecule, or perhaps other polymers. Traditionally, this effect is often treated theoretically with the help of the well known Marcus theory, which itself represents a remarkable example of an application of the intuition in physics. Attempting to show a bit more microscopic grounds to the charge transfer between localized states, we expect that in these nanostructure systems the key role is played by the interaction of the charge carriers with atomic lattice vibrations. In particular, we show the role of the multiple scattering of the charge carriers on the optical phonons. The charge carrier transport will be discussed theoretically basing on this scheme of thoughts. The resulting characteristics will be compared with the significant experimental results on the charge transport in molecular charge transfer crystals and also in DNA molecule. A connection to the popular Marcus semiclassical charge transfer theory between molecules will also be discussed. The nonequilibrium quantum electronic transport theory based on the nonequilibrium Green's functions will be used in the theoretical treatment.