A remote electron moving a distance away and parallel to a two-dimensional electron system (2DES) in a perpendicular magnetic field is mapped into a polaron problem. In high magnetic fields the 2DES crystallizes into a Wigner lattice having two hybrid phonon modes which are neither longitudinal nor transverse. The remote electron interacts with these hybrid phonons and forms a composite quasiparticle of electron plus Wigner crystal distortion which is called a Wigner polaron. The ground-state energy of the Wigner polaron is calculated using second-order perturbation theory and the results are related to an experiment on resonant tunneling.

• Received 30 October 1998

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.59.14342