3,132 research outputs found
High Temperature Superconductivity: the explanation
Soon after the discovery of the first high temperature superconductor by
Georg Bednorz and Alex Mueller in 1986 the late Sir Nevill Mott answering his
own question "Is there an explanation?" [Nature v 327 (1987) 185] expressed a
view that the Bose-Einstein condensation (BEC) of small bipolarons, predicted
by us in 1981, could be the one. Several authors then contemplated BEC of real
space tightly bound pairs, but with a purely electronic mechanism of pairing
rather than with the electron-phonon interaction (EPI). However, a number of
other researchers criticized the bipolaron (or any real-space pairing) scenario
as incompatible with some angle-resolved photoemission spectra (ARPES), with
experimentally determined effective masses of carriers and unconventional
symmetry of the superconducting order parameter in cuprates. Since then the
controversial issue of whether the electron-phonon interaction (EPI) is crucial
for high-temperature superconductivity or weak and inessential has been one of
the most challenging problems of contemporary condensed matter physics. Here I
outline some developments in the bipolaron theory suggesting that the true
origin of high-temperature superconductivity is found in a proper combination
of strong electron-electron correlations with a significant finite-range
(Froehlich) EPI, and that the theory is fully compatible with the key
experiments.Comment: 8 pages, 2 figures, invited comment to Physica Script
Superlight small bipolarons from realistic long-range Coulomb and Fr\"ohlich interactions
We report analytical and numerical results on the two-particle states of the
polaronic t-Jp model derived recently with realistic Coulomb and
electron-phonon (Frohlich) interactions in doped polar insulators. Eigenstates
and eigenvalues are calculated for two different geometries. Our results show
that the ground state is a bipolaronic singlet, made up of two polarons. The
bipolaron size increases with increasing ratio of the polaron hopping integral
t to the exchange interaction Jp but remains small compared to the system size
in the whole range 0<t/Jp<1. Furthermore, the model exhibits a phase transition
to a superconducting state with a critical temperature well in excess of 100K.
In the range t/Jp<1, there are distinct charge and spin gaps opening in the
density of states, specific heat, and magnetic susceptibility well above Tc.Comment: Calculation section and discussion of gap have been updated. Revised
calculations now enhance the predicted T_c in our model to over 200 K at
large hoppin
Unconventional superconducting pairing by conventional phonons
The common wisdom that the phonon mechanism of electron pairing in the
weak-coupling Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) superconductors leads to
conventional s-wave Cooper pairs is revised. An inevitable anisotropy of sound
velocity in crystals makes the phonon-mediated attraction of electrons
non-local in space providing unconventional Cooper pairs with a nonzero orbital
momentum in a wide range of electron densities. As a result of this anisotropy
quasi-two dimensional charge carriers undergo a quantum phase transition from
an unconventional d-wave superconducting state to a conventional s-wave
superconductor with more carriers per unit cell. In the opposite
strong-coupling regime rotational symmetry breaking appears as a result of a
reduced Coulomb repulsion between unconventional bipolarons dismissing thereby
some constraints on unconventional pairing in the Bose-Einstein condensation
(BEC) limit. The conventional phonons, and not superexchange, are shown to be
responsible for the d-wave symmetry of cuprate superconductors, where the
on-site Coulomb repulsion is large.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, more references adde
Degenerate Plebanski Sector and Spin Foam Quantization
We show that the degenerate sector of Spin(4) Plebanski formulation of
four-dimensional gravity is exactly solvable and describes covariantly embedded
SU(2) BF theory. This fact ensures that its spin foam quantization is given by
the SU(2) Crane-Yetter model and allows to test various approaches of imposing
the simplicity constraints. Our analysis strongly suggests that restricting
representations and intertwiners in the state sum for Spin(4) BF theory is not
sufficient to get the correct vertex amplitude. Instead, for a general theory
of Plebanski type, we propose a quantization procedure which is by construction
equivalent to the canonical path integral quantization and, being applied to
our model, reproduces the SU(2) Crane-Yetter state sum. A characteristic
feature of this procedure is the use of secondary second class constraints on
an equal footing with the primary simplicity constraints, which leads to a new
formula for the vertex amplitude.Comment: 34 pages; changes in the abstract and introduction, a few references
adde
Vortex matter in the charged Bose liquid at absolute zero
The Gross-Pitaevskii-type equation is solved for the charge Bose liquid in
the external magnetic field at zero temperature. There is a vortex lattice with
locally broken charge neutrality. The boson density is modulated in real space
and each vortex is charged. Remarkably, there is no upper critical field at
zero temperature, so the density of single flux-quantum vortices monotonously
increases with the magnetic field up to B=infinity and no indication of a phase
transition. The size of each vortex core decreases as about 1/sqrt(B) keeping
the system globally charge neutral. If bosons are composed of two fermions, a
phase transition to a spin-polarized Fermi liquid at some magnetic field larger
than the pair-breaking field is predicted.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, references update
Pairing interactions and pairing mechanism in high temperature copper oxide superconductors
The polaron binding energy E_{p} in undoped parent cuprates has been
determined to be about 1.0 eV from the unconventional oxygen-isotope effect on
the antiferromagnetic ordering temperature. The deduced value of E_{p} is in
quantitative agreement with that estimated from independent optical data and
that estimated theoretically from the measured dielectric constants. The
substantial oxygen-isotope effect on the in-plane supercarrier mass observed in
optimally doped cuprates suggests that polarons are bound into the Cooper
pairs. We also identify the phonon modes that are strongly coupled to
conduction electrons from the angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy,
tunneling spectra, and optical data. We consistently show that there is a very
strong electron-phonon coupling feature at a phonon energy of about 20 meV
along the antinodal direction and that this coupling becomes weaker towards the
diagonal direction. We further show that high-temperature superconductivity in
cuprates is caused by strong electron-phonon coupling, polaronic effect, and
significant coupling with 2 eV Cu-O charge transfer fluctuation.Comment: 11 pages, 7 figure
Parameter-free expression for superconducting Tc in cuprates
A parameter-free expression for the superconducting critical temperature of
layered cuprates is derived which allows us to express Tc in terms of
experimentally measured parameters. It yields Tc values observed in about 30
lanthanum, yttrium and mercury-based samples for different levels of doping.
This remarkable agreement with the experiment as well as the unusual critical
behaviour and the normal-state gap indicate that many cuprates are close to the
Bose-Einstein condensation regime.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures. Will be published in Physical Review
Spin foam model from canonical quantization
We suggest a modification of the Barrett-Crane spin foam model of
4-dimensional Lorentzian general relativity motivated by the canonical
quantization. The starting point is Lorentz covariant loop quantum gravity. Its
kinematical Hilbert space is found as a space of the so-called projected spin
networks. These spin networks are identified with the boundary states of a spin
foam model and provide a generalization of the unique Barrette-Crane
intertwiner. We propose a way to modify the Barrett-Crane quantization
procedure to arrive at this generalization: the B field (bi-vectors) should be
promoted not to generators of the gauge algebra, but to their certain
projection. The modification is also justified by the canonical analysis of
Plebanski formulation. Finally, we compare our construction with other
proposals to modify the Barret-Crane model.Comment: 26 pages; presentation improved, important changes concerning the
closure constraint and the vertex amplitude; minor correctio
Theory of Superconducting of doped fullerenes
We develop the nonadiabatic polaron theory of superconductivity of
taking into account the polaron band narrowing and realistic
electron-phonon and Coulomb interactions. We argue that the crossover from the
BCS weak-coupling superconductivity to the strong-coupling polaronic and
bipolaronic superconductivity occurs at the BCS coupling constant independent of the adiabatic ratio, and there is nothing ``beyond'' Migdal's
theorem except small polarons for any realistic electron-phonon interaction. By
the use of the polaronic-type function and the ``exact'' diagonalization in the
truncated Hilbert space of vibrons (``phonons'') we calculate the ground state
energy and the electron spectral density of the molecule. This
allows us to describe the photoemission spectrum of in a wide
energy region and determine the electron-phonon interaction. The strongest
coupling is found with the high-frequency pinch mode and with the
Frenkel exciton. We clarify the crucial role of high-frequency bosonic
excitations in doped fullerenes which reduce the bare bandwidth and the Coulomb
repulsion allowing the intermediate and low-frequency phonons to couple two
small polarons in a Cooper pair. The Eliashberg-type equations are solved for
low-frequency phonons. The value of the superconducting , its pressure
dependence and the isotope effect are found to be in a remarkable agreement
with the available experimental data.Comment: 20 pages, Latex, 4 figures available upon reques
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