Modeling of cotunneling in quantum dot systems

Transport through nanosystems is treated within the second-order von Neumann approach. This approach bridges the gap between rate equations which neglect level broadening and cotunneling, and the transmission formalism, which is essentially based on the single-particle picture thereby treating many-particle interactions on an approximate level. Here we provide an alternative presentation of the method in order to clarify the underlying structure. Furthermore we apply it to the problem of cotunneling. It is shown that both elastic and inelastic cotunneling can be described quantitatively, while the transmission approach with a mean-field treatment of the interaction provides an artificial bistability.