The dynamics of tunneling centers (TC’s) in metallic systems is studied using the technique of bosonization. The interaction of the TC with the conduction electrons of the metal involves two processes, namely, the screening of the TC by electrons and the so-called electron assisted tunneling. The presence of the latter process leads to a different form of the renormalized tunneling frequency of the TC, and the tunneling motion is damped with a temperature dependent relaxation rate. As the temperature is lowered, the relaxation rate per temperature shows a steep rise as opposed to that in the absence of electron assisted process. It is expected that this behavior should be observed at very low temperatures in a careful experiment. The present work thus tries to go beyond the existing work on the dynamics of a two-level system in metals, by treating the electron assisted process.

• Received 13 March 1995

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.52.7976