Charge and energy transfer in ac-driven Coulomb-coupled double quantum dots

Abstract

Abstract We study the dynamics of charge and energy currents in a Coulomb-coupled double quantum dot system, when only one of the two dots is adiabatically driven by a time-periodic gate that modulates its energy level. Although the Coulomb coupling does not allow for electron transfer between the dots, it enables an exchange of energy between them which induces a time variation of charge in the undriven dot. We describe the effect of electron interactions at low temperature using a time-dependent slave-spin 1 formulation within mean field that efficiently captures the main effects of the strong correlations as well as the dynamical nature of the driving. We find that the currents induced in the undriven dot due to the mutual friction between inter-dot electrons are of the same order as those generated in the adiabatically driven dot. Interestingly, up to 43% of the energy injected by the ac sources can be transferred from the driven dot to the undriven one. We complete our analysis by studying the impact of the Coulomb interaction on the resistance of the quantum dot that is driven by the gate. Graphic abstract