Improved master equation approach to quantum transport: from Born to self-consistent Born approximation.

Beyond the second-order Born approximation, we propose an improved master equation approach to quantum transport under self-consistent Born approximation. The basic idea is to replace the free Green's function in the tunneling self-energy diagram by an effective reduced propagator under the Born approximation. This simple modification has remarkable consequences. It not only recovers the exact results for quantum transport through noninteracting systems under arbitrary voltages, but also predicts the challenging nonequilibrium Kondo effect. Compared to the nonequilibrium Green's function technique that formulates the calculation of specific correlation functions, the master equation approach contains richer dynamical information to allow more efficient studies for such as the shot noise and full counting statistics.