Local thermal probe in a model molecular chain: A dissipaton-based approach

We study a system consisting of an infinite one-dimensional model molecular chain locally coupled to a probe. Starting from the Hamiltonian of the chain-probe composite and the corresponding spectral densities, we evaluate the heat current between the probe and the chain. Inspired by the perspective of quantum dissipative dynamics, we adopt a dissipaton-based quantum approach that is nonperturbative and non-Markovian. The dissipaton algebra yields a set of hierarchically coupled equations of motion for the c-number dissipaton moments, with iterative cross-tier connections when higher-order chain-probe interactions are included. Numerical results reveal the effects of temperature, probe frequency, on-site energy modification, and higher-order couplings on heat transport.