Transport properties of strongly coupled electron–phonon liquids

Abstract

In this work we consider the hydrodynamic behavior of a coupled electron–phonon fluid, focusing on electronic transport under the conditions of strong phonon drag. This regime occurs when the rate of phonon equilibration due to e.g. umklapp scattering is much slower than the rate of normal electron–phonon collisions. Then phonons and electrons form a coupled out-of-equilibrium state where the total quasi-momentum of the electron–phonon fluid is conserved. A joint flow-velocity emerges as a collective hydrodynamic variable. We derive the equation of motion for this fluid from the underlying microscopic kinetic theory and elucidate its effective viscosity and thermal conductivity. In particular, we derive decay times of arbitrary harmonics of the distribution function and reveal its corresponding super-diffusive relaxation on the Fermi surface. We further consider several applications of this theory to magneto-transport properties in the Hall-bar and Corbino-disk geometries, relevant to experiments. In our analysis we allow for general boundary conditions that cover the crossover from no-slip to no-stress flows. Our approach also covers a crossover from the Stokes to the Ohmic regime under the conditions of the Gurzhi effect. In addition, we consider the frequency dependence of the surface impedance and non-equilibrium noise. For the latter, we notice that in the diffusive regime, a Fokker–Planck approximation, applied to the electron–phonon collision integral in the Eliashberg form, reduces it to a differential operator with Burgers type nonlinearity. As a result, the non-equilibrium distribution function has a shock-wave structure in the energy domain. The consequence of this behavior for the Fano factor of the noise is investigated. In conclusion we discuss connections and limitations of our results in the context of recent electron–phonon drag measurements in Dirac and Weyl semimetals, and layout directions for further extensions and developments.