The starting point - Ohm's law

Ohm's law is an empirical observation of conductors, which states that voltage is proportional to
current 𝑉 = 𝐼𝑅. Since we are interested in material properties, we would like to rewrite this into a
relation that does not depend on the conductor geometry. We achieve this by expressing the terms
in Ohm's law with their microscopic equivalents. Consider a conducting wire with crosssectional
𝜌𝑙
area 𝐴 and length 𝑙. Such a wire has resistance 𝑅 = 𝐴 where 𝜌 is the materialdependent resistivity.
𝑉
An applied voltage 𝑉 in the wire creates an electric field 𝐸 = 𝑙 . The resulting current 𝐼 in the wire
𝐼
is described by the current density 𝑗 ≡ 𝐴. Combining all these equations with Ohm's law, we get:

𝑙
𝑉 = 𝐼𝜌 𝐴 ⇒ 𝐸 = 𝜌𝑗.

Now that we see that Ohm's law relates local quantities 𝐸 and 𝑗, let us try to understand how this
relation may arise by considering motion of individual electrons conduct in metals.

The Drude model - assumptions

We consider the motion of the individual electrons following Drude, who applied Boltzmann's
kinetic theory of gases to electrons. We start from the following reasonable assumptions about how
electrons move:

• Electrons scatter randomly at uncorrelated times. The average time between scattering is
𝑑𝑡
𝜏. Therefore, the probability of scattering in a time interval 𝑑𝑡 is 𝜏

• After each scattering event, the electron's momentum randomizes with a zero average
⟨𝐩⟩ = 0
• Electrons are charged particles with charge −𝑒, so that the Lorentz force 𝐅 =
−𝑒(𝐄 + 𝐯 × 𝐁) acts on the electrons in between the scattering events.

The first assumption here is the least obvious: why does the time between scattering events not
depend on e.g. electron velocity? There is no physical answer to this: the model is only an
approximation. The second assumption can be justified by symmetry: since we expect the electrons
to scatter equally to all directions, their average velocity will be zero right after scattering. Also
note that for now we treat the electrons as classical particles, neglecting all quantum mechanical
effects. As we will see in the next lecture, quantum mechanical effects help to justify the first
assumption.

Even under these simplistic assumptions, the trajectory of the electrons is hard to calculate. Due to
the random scattering, each trajectory is different, and this is how several example trajectories look:

The Drude equation of motion

Our goal is finding the electric current density 𝐣. Each electron with charge −𝑒 and velocity 𝐯
carries current −𝑒𝐯. Therefore, if the electron density is 𝑛, the average current they carry is −𝑛𝑒⟨𝐯⟩.
Our goal is thus to compute the average velocity.
The key idea is that although the motion of an individual electron is hard to calculate, the average
motion of the electrons is much simpler.

For convenience from now on, we will omit the average brackets, and write 𝐯 instead of ⟨𝐯⟩. This
also applies to 𝐅. We derive an equation of motion for the "average" electron in the following way:
𝑑𝑡
Consider everything that happens in an (infinitesimal) time interval 𝑑𝑡. A fraction 𝜏 of the
electrons scatter, and their average velocity becomes zero:

𝑚𝐯(𝑡 + 𝑑𝑡) = 0.
𝑑𝑡
The rest of the electrons (1 − ) are accelerated by the Lorentz force 𝐅, so their velocity becomes:
𝜏

𝑚𝐯(𝑡 + 𝑑𝑡) = 𝑚𝐯(𝑡) + 𝐅 ⋅ 𝑑𝑡.

To find the average velocity, we take a weighted average of these two groups of particles:
𝑑𝑡 𝑑𝑡
𝑚𝐯(𝑡 + 𝑑𝑡) = [𝑚𝐯(𝑡) + 𝐅𝑑𝑡] (1 − )+0⋅ 𝜏
𝜏
𝑑𝑡
= [𝑚𝐯(𝑡) + 𝐅𝑑𝑡] (1 − ) .
𝜏
𝐯(𝐭) 𝐅
= 𝑚𝐯(𝑡) + 𝑑𝑡 [𝐅 − 𝑚 𝜏 ] − 𝜏 𝑑𝑡 2

We now neglect the term proportional to 𝑑𝑡 2 (it vanishes when 𝑑𝑡 → 0 ). Finally, we recognize
[𝐯(𝑡+𝑑𝑡)−𝐯(𝑡)] 𝑑𝐯(𝑡)
that = , which results in:
𝑑𝑡 𝑑𝑡

𝑑𝐯 𝐯
𝑚 𝑑𝑡 = −𝑚 𝜏 + 𝐅.

Observe that the first term on the right-hand side has the same form as a drag force: it always
decelerates the electrons.

This Drude equation of motion describing the velocity of the average electron is our main result.

Conductor in Electric Field

𝑑𝑝⃗
In an electric field 𝐹⃗ = −𝑒𝐸⃗⃗, and at steady state 𝑑𝑡 = 0, current density 𝑗⃗ = −𝑛𝑒𝑣⃗ where 𝑛 is the
𝑝⃗
electron density and 𝑣⃗ = ∗ with 𝑚∗ being the effective mass of the electron. (We will drop the
𝑚
" ∗ " in the following discussion.). The Drude equation now becomes:

𝑛𝑒 2 𝜏
𝑗⃗ = 𝐸⃗⃗.
𝑚

and we can read off the Drude conductivity (I: identity matrix):

𝑛𝑒 2 𝜏
𝜎𝑜 = 𝑚
𝐼.
Drude theory works amazingly well as an average theory, but it fails to accurately describe the
behavior of a single electron.

Conductor in Electro-Magnetic Field

The transport equation now becomes

𝑑𝑝⃗ 𝑝⃗
= −𝑒(𝐸⃗⃗ + 𝑣⃗ × 𝐵
⃗⃗) −
𝑑𝑡 𝜏

At steady state

1 𝑗⃗
𝐸⃗⃗ = ⃗⃗ +
𝑗⃗ × 𝐵
𝑛𝑒 𝜎𝑜

In matrix form

𝐸𝑥 𝐵𝑧 𝑗𝑦 − 𝐵𝑦 𝑗𝑧 𝑗
1 1 𝑥
𝐸
( 𝑦) = ( 𝐵 𝑗 − 𝐵 𝑗 ) + ( 𝑦) ⇒ 𝑗
𝑛𝑒 𝐵𝑥𝑗𝑧 − 𝐵𝑧 𝑗𝑥 𝜎𝑜
𝐸𝑧 𝑦 𝑥 𝑥 𝑦 𝑗𝑧
0 𝐵𝑧 𝐵𝑦
𝐸𝑥 𝐵𝑧 − 𝑗
− 𝑛𝑒 𝑛𝑒 1 𝑥
(𝐸𝑦 ) = 𝑛𝑒 𝑗𝑥 + 0 𝑗𝑦 + 𝐵𝑥 𝑗𝑧 + (𝑗𝑦 ) ⇒
𝐵𝑦 𝐵𝑥 𝜎𝑜
𝐸𝑧 𝑛𝑒 𝑗𝑧
−
( 𝑛𝑒 ) ( 𝑛𝑒) ( 0 )
1 𝐵𝑧 𝐵𝑦
−
𝜎𝑜 𝑛𝑒 𝑛𝑒
𝐸𝑥 𝑗𝑥
𝐵𝑧 1 𝐵𝑥
(𝐸𝑦 ) = − (𝑗𝑦 )
𝑛𝑒 𝜎𝑜 𝑛𝑒
𝐸𝑧 𝑗𝑧
𝐵𝑦 𝐵𝑥 1
−
( 𝑛𝑒 𝑛𝑒 𝜎𝑜 )

and we can read off the resistivity matrix

1 𝐵𝑧 𝐵𝑦
−
𝜎𝑜 𝑛𝑒 𝑛𝑒
𝐵𝑧 1 𝐵𝑥
𝜌= −
𝑛𝑒 𝜎𝑜 𝑛𝑒
𝐵𝑦 𝐵𝑥 1
−
( 𝑛𝑒 𝑛𝑒 𝜎𝑜 )
 ⃗⃗ = 𝐵𝑧ˆ, the conductivity
In the simple case when 𝐵

1 −𝜔𝑐 𝜏 0
𝜎𝑜
𝜎= 𝜌−1 = (𝜔𝑐 𝜏 1 0 )
1 + (𝜔𝑐 𝜏)2
0 0 1 + (𝜔𝑐 𝜏)2

𝑒𝐵
where 𝜔𝑐 = is the cyclotron frequency.
𝑚