ELECTRON RELAXATION IN QUANTUM DOTS BY MEANS OF AUGER PROCESSES

The present theoretical work deals with the relaxation of hot electrons in quantum dots by Coulomb scattering with an electron-hole plasma. A random-phase approximation is used which includes single-particle and collective-plasma excitations. We discuss the influence of the dot size, plasma density, and temperature. The resulting transition rates are of the order of 10(12) s-1 for a plasma density of 10(15) m-2 in In0.53Ga0.47As/InP. In the presence of a dense electron-hole plasma, hot electrons can relax efficiently by Auger processes, even in small semiconductor quantum dots where the relaxation by phonon scattering is weak.