Progress Report: Henrickson’s Derivation for

Electron-Photon Self-Energy
Oka Kurniawan
May 14, 2009

1 Introduction
This report gives a more detail derivation of the self-energy expression given
in Henrickson’s paper [1]. Most of the derivation shown here is provided in
the original paper. The purpose is just to point out some details required to
understand the derivation.

2 Derivation
2.1 Electromagnetic Interaction Hamiltonian
We recall that the electromagnetic wave can be written in terms of the vector
and scalar potentials.

∂A
E=− − ∇φ (1)
∂t
B =∇ × A (2)

where E is the electric field, A is the vector potential, φ is the scalar potential,
and B is the magnetic field.
The Hamiltonian is given by
 2   
0 1 p q
H =H +H = +U + A·p (3)
2m0 m0

where the first bracket is the zeroth-order Hamiltonian, and the second
bracket is the electromagnetic interaction part.

1
 Now let us write the vector potential in terms of the bosonic annihilation
and creation operators

A(x, t) = A0 (x)(be−iωt + b† eiωt ) (4)

where A0 (x) is dtermined by

ω2
∇2 A0 (x) + A0 (x) = 0 (5)
c2
The solution to this equation has the general form

A0 (x) = A0 eik·x (6)

where k is the wave vector. We can substitute this back to (5) to verify it.

ω2
−k 2 A0 eik·x + A0 eik·x = 0 (7)
c2
The summation gives zero if k is related to the frequency ω by
ω
k= (8)
c
In a material it becomes
ω√
k= µr ǫr (9)
c
In free space the square root gives unity.
Now let us solve for A0 . Substituting (4) to (1) and (2) as well as using
(6) gives us

E = −A0 (x) −iωbe−iωt + iωb† eiωt

= iωA0ei(k·x−ωt − iωA∗0 e−i(k·x−ωt) (10)

i(k·x−ωt)
B = ik × A0 e − ik × A∗0 e−i(k·x−ωt) (11)

The energy density of the electromagnetic field is

1
E = (D · E + B · H) (12)
2
from this we can get the time averaged energy density as

Eavg = 2ǫω 2 A20 (13)

2
and integrating over volume, we get the time average total energy as

2ǫω 2 V A20 (14)

Assuming that the field energy is due to a photon with energy ~ω, we have

~ω =2ǫω 2 V A20
r
~
A0 = (15)
2ωǫV
We want to reexpressed this in terms of photon flux
Nc
Iω ≡ √ (16)
V µr ǫr

which is defined as the number of photon per unit time per unit area. Sub-
stituting the V in (15) using this expression, we get
√
Iω ~ µr ǫr 1/2
 
A0 = (17)
2ωǫNc

Note that the direction of A0 is determined by the polarization of the field,

which we will denote by â. So now the vector potential is given by
√
Iω ~ µr ǫr 1/2
 
be−iωt + b† eiωt


A(x, t) = â (18)
2ωǫNc
where we have made a dipole approximation ek·x ≈ 1.
Now we have obtained the expression for the vector potential, and ready
to calculate the interaction Hamiltonian. We first write the interaction
Hamiltonian in the second quantized Hamiltonian as given by
X
H1 = hl|H 1 |mia†l am (19)
lm

where l and m are the site-basis eigenstates. The matrix element is

q
hl|H 1|mi = A · hl|p|mi (20)
m0
Now we assume that the field is polarized in the ẑ direction. Then the
matrix element becomes
 √ 1/2    
~ µ r ǫr  p̂z 
hl|H 1 |mi = q Iω (be−iωt + b† eiωt ) × l   m (21)
2Nωǫc m0

3
Recall that p = mv, so that p/m = v = dx/dt. Therefore,
           
 p̂z   dz   i  0 
l   m = l   m = l  H , z  m (22)
m0 dt ~
where we have used the following relationship in the last term.
* +
d i ∂ Q̂
hQi = h[Ĥ, Q̂]i + (23)
dt ~ ∂t

In most cases ∂ Q̂/∂t = 0.

Now we can write the last term as
hl|H 0z − zH 0 |mi = hl|H 0 z|mi − hl|zH 0 |mi
= zm hl|H 0 |mi − zl hl|H 0|mi (24)
Hence    
 p̂z  i
l   m = (zm − zl ) l H 0  m

  
(25)
m0 ~
when we substitute this back, we will get
 √ 1/2
1 iq ~ µr ǫr
hl|H |mi = (zm − zl ) Iω (be−iωt + b† eiωt )hl|H 0|mi (26)
~ 2Nωǫc
and from (19)
 √ 1/2
X iq ~ µr ǫr
1
H = (zm − zl ) Iω (be−iωt + b† eiωt )hl|H 0|mia†l am (27)
lm
~ 2Nωǫc
If we use finite difference, the matrix element is discretized as
 ~2
 m∗ ∆2 + Uj , j = k
2
Hjk = − ~ ,j = k ± 1 (28)
 2m∗ ∆2
0 , otherwise
Note that if l = m, then zm − zl = 0 and hl|H 1|mi = 0. If m = l + 1, then
zm − zl = ∆. On the other hand, if m = l − 1, then zm − zl = −∆. Hence,
the interaction Hamiltonian can be written as
X
H1 = Mlm (b−iωt + b† eiωt )a†l am (29)
lm
where  √ 1/2
q~ ~ µr ǫr
Mlm = Iω Plm (30)
i2m∗ ∆ 2Nωǫc
and 
 +1 , m = l + 1
Plm = −1 , m = l − 1 (31)
0 , else


4
2.2 Electron-Photon Self-Energy
The lowest-order contribution to the less-than and greater-than self-energies
for electron-photon interactions are given by
X
Σ>lm (t1 , t2 ) = G> >
pq (t1 , t2 )Dlp;qm (t1 , t2 ) (32)
pq
X
Σ<
lm (t1 , t2 ) = G< <
pq (t1 , t2 )Dlp;qm (t1 , t2 ) (33)
pq

where D ≷ are the photon propagators

<

1
(t2 )Hlp1 (t1 )

Dlp;qm (t1 , t2 ) ≡ = Hqm (34)
>
(t1 , t2 ) ≡ = Hlp1 (t1 )Hqm
1


Dlp;qm (t2 ) (35)

Assuming that the photon population remains at equilibrium, we can show

that

hb(t1 )b(t2 )i = 0 (36)

hb(t1 )b† (t2 )i = (N + 1)e−iω(t1 −t2 ) (37)
hb† (t1 )b(t2 )i = Neiω(t1 −t2 ) (38)
hb† (t1 )b† (t2 )i = 0 (39)

Recall that the matrix element for the interaction Hamiltonian is given
by (29), or
Hlp1 (t1 ) = Mlp be−iωt1 + b† eiωt1


(40)
Substituting this into (34) and (35) gives

>
Dlp;qm (t1 , t2 ) = Mlp Mqm be−iωt1 beiωt2 + b† e−iωt1 beiωt2
+be−iωt1 b† eiωt2 + b† e−iωt1 b† eiωt2


(41)
Mlp Mqm Neiω(t1 −t2 ) + (N + 1)e−iω(t1 −t2 )


= (42)

In steady state, we can Fourier transform with respect to t1 − t2 .

>
Dlp;qm (E) = 2πMlp Mqm {Nδ(E + ~ω) + (N + 1)δ(E − ~ω)} (43)

Similarly, we can obtain

<
Dlp;qm (E) = 2πMlp Mqm {Nδ(E − ~ω) + (N + 1)δ(E + ~ω)} (44)

Substituting these into (32) and (33) gives the self-energies

5
 X
Σ>
lm (E) = Mlp Mqm {Nδ(E + ~ω) + (N + 1)δ(E − ~ω)} (45)
pq
X
Σ<
lm (E) = Mlp Mqm {Nδ(E − ~ω) + (N + 1)δ(E + ~ω)} (46)
pq

Then the retarded self-energy can be obtained from the above equations
through

dE ′ Σ< ′ < ′
lm (E ) − Σlm (E )
Z
R
Σlm (E) = i (47)
2π E − E ′ + iη

References
[1] L. E. Henrickson, “Nonequilibrium photocurrent modeling in res-
onant tunneling photodetectors,” Journal of Applied Physics,
vol. 91, no. 10, pp. 6273–6281, 2002. [Online]. Available:
http://link.aip.org/link/?JAP/91/6273/1