We explore electronic transport in a nanotube quantum dot strongly coupled with vibrations and weakly with leads and the thermal environment. We show that the recent observation of anomalous conductance signatures in single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) quantum dots can be understood quantitatively in terms of current driven `hot phonons' that are strongly correlated with electrons. Using rate equations in the many-body configuration space for the joint electron-phonon distribution, we argue that the variations are indicative of strong electron-phonon coupling requiring an analysis beyond the traditional uncorrelated phonon-assisted transport (Tien-Gordon) approach.
@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0606273,
title = {Phonon runaway in nanotube quantum dots},
author = {L. Siddiqui and A. W. Ghosh and S. Datta},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0606273},
year = {2009}
}