Electron transport in parallel interacting artificial molecules

The low-field conductance of interacting artificial molecular wires is simulated using a single-electron model. Coupled artificial molecules consisting of parallel chains of open quantum dots in a two-dimensional electron gas display a split-off molecular band with an energy separation that grows with the coupling strength. The position of the Fermi energy relative to the molecular band states plays a dominant role in determining the low-field conductance. The predicted conductance variation with coupling for dual five-atom molecular wires ranges from oscillatory to monotonic, depending on the Fermi energy. For electron energies near a resonant state, results imply that conductance measurements on molecules in parallel could vary significantly with the inter-molecular spacing.