Electron transfer mechanism and the locality of the system-bath interaction: A comparison of local, semilocal, and pure dephasing models
- Department of Chemistry and Center for Nanofabrication and Molecular Self-Assembly, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois 60208-3113 (United States)
We simulate the effects of two types of dephasing processes, a nonlocal dephasing of system eigenstates and a dephasing of semilocal eigenstates, on the rate and mechanism of electron transfer (eT) through a series of donor-bridge-acceptor systems, D-B{sub N}-A, where N is the number of identical bridge units. Our analytical and numerical results show that pure dephasing, defined as the perturbation of system eigenstates through the system-bath interaction, does not disrupt coherent eT because it induces no localization; electron transfer may proceed through superexchange in a system undergoing only pure dephasing. A more physically reasonable description may be obtained via a system-bath interaction that reflects the perturbation of more local electronic structure by local nuclear distortions and dipole interactions. The degree of locality of this interaction is guided by the structure of the system Hamiltonian and by the nature of the measurement performed on the system (i.e., the nature of the environment). We compare our result from this 'semilocal' model with an even more local phenomenological dephasing model. We calculate electron transfer rate by obtaining nonequilibrium steady-state solutions for the elements of a reduced density matrix; a semigroup formalism is used to write down the dissipative part of the equation of motion.
- OSTI ID:
- 20783231
- Journal Information:
- Journal of Chemical Physics, Vol. 124, Issue 7; Other Information: DOI: 10.1063/1.2168457; (c) 2006 American Institute of Physics; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0021-9606
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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