Repulsion of single-well fundamental edge magnetoplasmons in double quantum wells

Abstract

A {\it microscopic} treatment of fundamental edge magnetoplasmons (EMPs) along the edge of a double quantum well (DQW) is presented for strong magnetic fields, low temperatures, and total filling factor \nu=2. It is valid for lateral confining potentials that Landau level (LL) flattening can be neglected. The cyclotron and Zeeman energies are assumed larger than the DQW energy splitting \sqrt{\Delta^2 +4T^2}, where \Delta is the splitting of the isolated wells and T the tunneling matrix element. %hen calculated unperturbed density profile is sharp at the edge. Using a random-phase approximation (RPA), which includes local and nonlocal contributions to the current density, it is shown that for negligible tunnel coupling 2T << \Delta the inter-well Coulomb coupling leads to two DQW fundamental EMPs which are strongly renormalized in comparison with the decoupled, single-well fundamental EMP. These DQW modes can be modified further upon varying the inter-well distance d, along the z axis, and/or the separation of the wells' edges \Delta y along the y axis. The charge profile of the {\it fast} and {\it slow} DQW mode varies, respectively, in an {\it acoustic} and {\it optical} manner along the y axis and is not smooth on the \ell_{0} scale. For strong tunneling \Delta\alt 2T these DQW modes are essentially modified when \Delta is changed by applying a transverse electric field to the DQW.