Association of scattering matrices in quantum networks

Algorithms based on operations that associate scattering matrices in series or in parallel (analogous to impedance association in a classical circuit) are developed here. We exemplify their application by calculating the total scattering matrix of several types of quantum networks, such as star graphs and a chain of chaotic quantum dots, obtaining results with good agreement with the literature. Through a computational-time analysis we compare the efficiency of two algorithms for the simulation of a chain of chaotic quantum dots based on series association operations of (i) two-by-two centers and (ii) three-by-three ones. Empirical results point out that the algorithm (ii) is more efficient than (i) for small number of open scattering channels. A direct counting of floating point operations justifies quantitatively the superiority of the algorithm (i) for large number of open scattering channels.