Electron-Photon interaction in resonant tunneling diodes

Abstract

We develope a model to describe the transmission coefficient and tunneling current in the presence of photon-electron coupling in a resonant diode. Our model takes into account multiphoton processes as well as the transitions between electronic states with different wave numbers. This is crutial to explain the experimental features observed in the tunneling current through a double barrier which cannot be reproduced with more simplified established models. According to our results, what experiments show in the current density are quantum photon-assisted features coming from multiphoton transitions which are not related with sample heating.