Effects of strong electric fields in a polyacetylene chain

In this work, we study the effects related to the creation of electron/hole pairs via application of an external electric field that acts on a pristine trans-polyacetylene molecular chain at zero-temperature. This phenomenon is termed Schwinger–Landau–Zener (SLZ) effect and arises when a physical system, which can even be the vacuum, is under the action of a strong, static and spatially homogeneous electric field. Initially, we investigate how the electrical conductivity of the polyacetylene changes with the applied field, by considering the carriers production as well as the variation of the interband gap according to certain ab initio models. Next, we analyse the competition between the SLZ effect and another one associated with the incidence of an uniform electric field on one-dimensional crystals – the Bloch oscillations. We evaluate the conditions in which these latter can be destroyed by the particles created through the same field that induces them, and verify the possibility of occurrence of the Bloch oscillations inside the trans-polyacetylene with frequencies equal to or higher than the terahertz scale.