Mathematical Model of Resonances and Tunneling in a System with a Bound State

A. Uma Maheswari, P. Prema, Sidhaarth Mahadevan +1 more

Gilad Zangwill, Er’el Granot

The existence of Fano resonances in dynamic resonant tunneling (RT) systems has been investigated. Fano resonances are characterized by the appearance of a 100% reflection coefficient in proximity to a high transmission coefficient. For a Fano resonance to appear, a bound state must exist. On the other hand, a resonant tunneling process is characterized by a high transmission and the existence of a quasi-bound state (QBS) instead of a bound one. It has been shown that, by narrowing the width of the barrier, the resonance energy of the QBS gradually decreases and eventually turns into a bound state. Consequently, in a dynamic RT process, there are two scenarios: either a bound state exists, in which case, Fano resonances exist for any barrier width, or a QBS exists, and the barrier should be narrow enough for the Fano resonance to appear. In both cases, the incoming particle’s frequency must be lower than the oscillating well’s frequency. In this work, these resonances are investigated in detail, and both exactly numerically and approximated analytical expressions are derived for both the weak and strong oscillating amplitude regimes. One of the conclusions is that, when the oscillating frequency is low enough, multiple Fano resonances can appear by varying the barrier’s width. Since these resonances are very sharp and zero transmission can easily be detected, this property can be used as a very accurate method for measuring the barrier’s width, even when the particle’s de-Broglie wavelength is much larger than the barrier’s width.

M. M. Nieto, D. Rodney Truax

Michael Martin Nieto, Vincent P. Gutschick, Carl M. Bender +2 more

Mark R. A. Shegelski, Joshua Pittman, Rob Vogt +2 more

We study in three dimensions a diatomic homo-nuclear molecule with many bound states incident upon a potential barrier. We consider different initial states for the molecule and take into account transitions between rotational states of the molecule during the process in which the entire molecule tunnels past or is reflected by the external potential barrier. We show the manner in which the transmission resonances are affected by having many bound states. We find that the transmission probability profile in three dimensions is markedly different from that for two bound states in three dimensions, and for many bound states in one dimension. We find important new results. One result is that resonant or near resonant tunnelling and resonant or near resonant reflection can both occur within a small energy range of the molecule. We also find that tunnelling with transmission probability close to unity can occur over a wide energy range.

Michael J. Davis, Eric J. Heller

Tunneling involves an allowed quantum event which fails to take place classically. Dynamical tunneling is the subset of such events which do not involve a classically insurmountable potential barrier. In this paper, we present unambiguous evidence for dynamical tunneling in bound state quantum systems.The tunneling occurs between two distinct regions of classically trapped quasiperiodic motion. Close analogies are shown to exist between this situation and ordinary barrier penetration in a double minimum potential. In the cases we study, tunneling occurs between equivalent or nearly equivalent local mode motions, which have arisen out of a resonance between the symmetric and nonsymmetric stretch.