Pseudogaps due to sound modes: from incommensurate charge density waves to semiconducting wires

Abstract

We consider pseudogap effects for electrons interacting with gapless modes. We study both generic 1D semiconductors with acoustic phonons and incommensurate charge density waves. We calculate the subgap absorption as it can be observed by means of the photo electron or tunneling spectroscopy. Within the formalism of functional integration and the adiabatic approximation, the probabilities are described by nonlinear configurations of an instanton type. Particularities of both cases are determined by the topological nature of stationary excited states (acoustic polarons or amplitude solitons) and by presence of gapless phonons which change the usual dynamics to the regime of the quantum dissipation. Below the free particle edge the pseudogap starts with the exponential (stretched exponential for gapful phonons) decrease of transition rates. Deeply within the pseudogap they are dominated by a power law, in contrast with nearly exponential law for gapful modes.