Numerical method for hydrodynamic modulation equations describing Bloch oscillations in semiconductor superlattices

DOI10.1016/J.JCP.2012.02.024zbMATH Open1245.76078arXiv1205.1292OpenAlexW2008560541MaRDI QIDQ440652FDOQ440652

L. L. Bonilla, M. Carretero, M. Álvaro

Publication date: 19 August 2012

Published in: Journal of Computational Physics (Search for Journal in Brave)

Abstract: We present a finite difference method to solve a new type of nonlocal hydrodynamic equations that arise in the theory of spatially inhomogeneous Bloch oscillations in semiconductor superlattices. The hydrodynamic equations describe the evolution of the electron density, electric field and the complex amplitude of the Bloch oscillations for the electron current density and the mean energy density. These equations contain averages over the Bloch phase which are integrals of the unknown electric field and are derived by singular perturbation methods. Among the solutions of the hydrodynamic equations, at a 70 K lattice temperature, there are spatially inhomogeneous Bloch oscillations coexisting with moving electric field domains and Gunn-type oscillations of the current. At higher temperature (300 K) only Bloch oscillations remain. These novel solutions are found for restitution coefficients in a narrow interval below their critical values and disappear for larger values. We use an efficient numerical method based on an implicit second-order finite difference scheme for both the electric field equation (of drift-diffusion type) and the parabolic equation for the complex amplitude. Double integrals appearing in the nonlocal hydrodynamic equations are calculated by means of expansions in modified Bessel functions. We use numerical simulations to ascertain the convergence of the method. If the complex amplitude equation is solved using a first order scheme for restitution coefficients near their critical values, a spurious convection arises that annihilates the complex amplitude in the part of the superlattice that is closer to the cathode. This numerical artifact disappears if the space step is appropriately reduced or we use the second-order numerical scheme.

Full work available at URL: https://arxiv.org/abs/1205.1292

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zbMATH Keywords

Bloch oscillationsnonlocal hydrodynamic equationsself-sustained current oscillationssemiconductor superlatticespurious convection

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Finite difference methods applied to problems in fluid mechanics (76M20) PDEs in connection with fluid mechanics (35Q35) Finite difference methods for initial value and initial-boundary value problems involving PDEs (65M06) Statistical mechanics of semiconductors (82D37)

Cites Work

• On quantum hydrodynamic and quantum energy transport models
• Kinetic relaxation models for energy transport
• Numerical study of hyperbolic equations with integral constraints arising in semiconductor theory
• A theory of the electrical breakdown of solid dielectrics
• Self-sustained current oscillations in the kinetic theory of semiconductor superlattices

Cited In (1)

• Finite difference numerical method for the superlattice Boltzmann transport equation and case comparison of CPU(C) and GPU(CUDA) implementations

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