Electron streaming caused by inelastic acoustic-phonon scattering in quantum wires.

Abstract

A nonlinear regime of electron transport in quasi-one-dimensional quantum wires has been predicted and investigated by the Monte Carlo technique. The electron transport in this regime closely resembles electron streaming. However, in contrast to conventional electron streaming caused by periodic emission of optical phonons, the streaming reported here is due to periodic acoustic-phonon emission. This effect originates from strongly inelastic acoustic-phonon scattering in quantum wires. The streaming occurs at low temperatures in a wide range of electric fields and is characterized by an oscillating-velocity autocorrelation function and a nonlinear velocity-field dependence. Both the analytical model and the Monte Carlo simulations yield an ${\mathit{E}}^{1/5}$ field dependence of the drift velocity and an ${\mathit{E}}^{2/5}$ dependence of the mean energy as a function of electric field E in the streaming regime.