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Semiconductor superlattices are periodic nanostructures consisting of epitaxially grown quantum wells and barriers. For thick barriers, the quantum wells are weakly coupled and the main transport mechanism is a sequential resonant tunneling of electrons between wells. We review quantum transport in these materials, and the rate equations for electron densities, currents, and the self-consistent electric potential or field. Depending on superlattice configuration, doping density, temperature, voltage bias, and other parameters, superlattices behave as excitable systems, and can respond to abrupt dc bias changes by large transients involving charge density waves before arriving at a stable stationary state. For other parameters, the superlattices may have self-sustained oscillations of the current through them. These oscillations are due to repeated triggering and recycling of charge density waves, and can be periodic in time, quasiperiodic, and chaotic. Modifying the superlattice configuration, it is possible to attain robust chaos due to wave dynamics. External noise of appropriate strength can generate time-periodic current oscillations when the superlattice is in a stable stationary state without noise, which is called the coherence resonance. In turn, these oscillations can resonate with a periodic signal in the presence of sufficient noise, thereby displaying a stochastic resonance. These properties can be exploited to design and build many devices. Here, we describe detectors of weak signals by using coherence and stochastic resonance and fast generators of true random sequences useful for safe communications and storage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, we present a numerical study of the influence of matrix degrading enzyme (MDE) dynamics and haptotaxis on the development of vessel networks in tumor-induced angiogenesis. Avascular tumors produce growth factors that induce nearby blood vessels to emit sprouts formed by endothelial cells. These capillary sprouts advance toward the tumor by chemotaxis (gradients of growth factor) and haptotaxis (adhesion to the tissue matrix outside blood vessels). The motion of the capillaries in this constrained space is modelled by stochastic processes (Langevin equations, branching and merging of sprouts) coupled to continuum equations for concentrations of involved substances. There is a complementary deterministic description in terms of the density of actively moving tips of vessel sprouts. The latter forms a stable soliton-like wave whose motion is influenced by the different taxis mechanisms. We show the delaying effect of haptotaxis on the advance of the angiogenic vessel network by direct numerical simulations of the stochastic process and by a study of the soliton motion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Charge transport in nanosized electronic systems is described by semiclassical or quantum kinetic equations that are often costly to solve numerically and difficult to reduce systematically to macroscopic balance equations for densities, currents, temperatures and other moments of macroscopic variables. The maximum entropy principle can be used to close the system of equations for the moments but its accuracy or range of validity are not always clear. In this paper, we compare numerical solutions of balance equations for nonlinear electron transport in semiconductor superlattices. The equations have been obtained from Boltzmann-Poisson kinetic equations very far from equilibrium for strong fields, either by the maximum entropy principle or by a systematic Chapman-Enskog perturbation procedure. Both approaches produce the same current-voltage characteristic curve for uniform fields. When the superlattices are DC voltage biased in a region where there are stable time periodic solutions corresponding to recycling and motion of electric field pulses, the differences between the numerical solutions produced by numerically solving both types of balance equations are smaller than the expansion parameter used in the perturbation procedure. These results and possible new research venues are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]