Developing better nano-electronics by understanding nonadiabatic effects

“Basically,” Michele Lazzeri tells PhysOrg.com, “the Born-Oppenheimer adiabatic approximation tells us how atoms are vibrating.” This adiabatic effect is used to describe phonons, which are modes of vibration that have been quantized. “It’s basic textbook stuff in solid state physics,” Lazzeri continues, “but sometimes the Born-Oppenheimer adiabatic approximation fails.”