Intrasubband and Intersubband Electron Relaxation in Semiconductor Quantum Wire Structures

Abstract

We calculate the intersubband and intrasubband many-body inelastic Coulomb scattering rates due to electron-electron interaction in two-subband semiconductor quantum wire structures. We analyze our relaxation rates in terms of contributions from inter- and intrasubband charge-density excitations separately. We show that the intersubband (intrasubband) charge-density excitations are primarily responsible for intersubband (intrasubband) inelastic scattering. We identify the contributions to the inelastic scattering rate coming from the emission of the single-particle and the collective excitations individually. We obtain the lifetime of hot electrons injected in each subband as a function of the total charge density in the wire.