Current in open quantum systems
Materials Science
2009-11-10 v1
Abstract
We show that a dissipative current component is present in the dynamics generated by a Liouville-master equation, in addition to the usual component associated with Hamiltonian evolution. The dissipative component originates from coarse graining in time, implicit in a master equation, and needs to be included to preserve current continuity. We derive an explicit expression for the dissipative current in the context of the Markov approximation. Finally, we illustrate our approach with a simple numerical example, in which a quantum particle is coupled to a harmonic phonon bath and dissipation is described by the Pauli master equation.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0410105,
title = {Current in open quantum systems},
author = {Ralph Gebauer and Roberto Car},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0410105},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
To appear in Phys. Rev. Lett