Impact ionization processes in a photodriven Mott insulator: Influence of phononic dissipation

Paolo Gazzaneo*, Tommaso Maria Mazzocchi, Jan Lotze, Enrico Arrigoni

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

We study a model for photovoltaic energy collection consisting of a Mott-insulating layer in presence of acoustic phonons, coupled to two wide-band fermion leads at different chemical potentials and driven into a nonequilibrium steady state by a periodic electric field. We treat electron correlations with nonequilibrium dynamical mean-field theory using the so-called auxiliary master-equation approach as impurity solver and include dissipation by acoustic phonons via the Migdal approximation. For a small hybridization to the leads, we obtain a peak in the photocurrent as a function of the driving frequency which can be associated with impact ionization processes. For larger hybridizations the shallow peak suggests a suppression of impact ionization with respect to direct photovoltaic excitations. Acoustic phonons slightly enhance the photocurrent for small driving frequencies and suppress it at frequencies around the main peak at all considered hybridization strengths.
Original languageEnglish
Article number195140
JournalPhysical Review B
Volume106
Issue number19
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 15 Nov 2022

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Electronic, Optical and Magnetic Materials
  • Condensed Matter Physics

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