1304.4754 (Kirsten Andersen et al.)

Hybridization of quantum plasmon modes in coupled nanowires: From the
classical to the tunneling regime    [PDF]

Kirsten Andersen, Kristian L. Jensen, Kristian S. Thygesen

We present full quantum mechanical calculations of the hybridized plasmon modes of two nanowires at small separation, providing real space visualization of the modes in the transition from the classical to the quantum tunneling regime. The plasmon modes are obtained as certain eigenfunctions of the dynamical dielectric function which is computed using time dependent density functional theory (TDDFT). For freestanding wires, the energy of both surface and bulk plasmon modes deviate from the classical result for low wire radii and high momentum transfer due to effects of electron spill-out, non-local response, and coupling to single-particle transitions. For the wire dimer at separations 1.5-0.3 nm, the spatial shape and energy of the plasmon modes are continuously altered with distance and deviate from the classical result due to the increasing overlap of unoccupied electronic states of the two wires (virtual tunneling). At separations around 2-3 {\AA} electrons at the Fermi energy can tunnel between the two wires and a charge-transfer mode appears.

View original: http://arxiv.org/abs/1304.4754