31 research outputs found
Oscillating Nernst-Ettingshausen effect in Bismuth across the quantum limit
In elemental Bismuth, 10 atoms share a single itinerant electron.
Therefore, a moderate magnetic field can confine electrons to the lowest Landau
level. We report on the first study of metallic thermoelectricity in this
regime. The main thermoelectric response is off-diagonal with an oscillating
component several times larger than the non-oscillating background. When the
first Landau level attains the Fermi Energy, both the Nernst and the
Ettingshausen coefficients sharply peak, and the latter attains a
temperature-independent maximum. A qualitative agreement with a theory invoking
current-carrying edge excitations is observed.Comment: Final published versio
Nernst effect in semi-metals: the meritorious heaviness of electrons
We present a study of electric, thermal and thermoelectric transport in
elemental Bismuth, which presents a Nernst coefficient much larger than what
was found in correlated metals. We argue that this is due to the combination of
an exceptionally low carrier density with a very long electronic
mean-free-path. The low thermomagnetic figure of merit is traced to the
lightness of electrons. Heavy-electron semi-metals, which keep a metallic
behavior in presence of a magnetic field, emerge as promising candidates for
thermomagnetic cooling at low temperatures.Comment: 4 pages, including 4 figure
Nernst effect as a probe of superconducting fluctuations in disordered thin films
In amorphous superconducting thin films of and ,
a finite Nernst coefficient can be detected in a wide range of temperature and
magnetic field. Due to the negligible contribution of normal quasi-particles,
superconducting fluctuations easily dominate the Nernst response in the entire
range of study. In the vicinity of the critical temperature and in the
zero-field limit, the magnitude of the signal is in quantitative agreement with
what is theoretically expected for the Gaussian fluctuations of the
superconducting order parameter. Even at higher temperatures and finite
magnetic field, the Nernst coefficient is set by the size of superconducting
fluctuations. The Nernst coefficient emerges as a direct probe of the ghost
critical field, the normal-state mirror of the upper critical field. Moreover,
upon leaving the normal state with fluctuating Cooper pairs, we show that the
temperature evolution of the Nernst coefficient is different whether the system
enters a vortex solid, a vortex liquid or a phase-fluctuating superconducting
regime.Comment: Submitted to New. J. Phys. for a focus issue on "Superconductors with
Exotic Symmetries
The Nernst effect and the boundaries of the Fermi liquid picture
Following the observation of an anomalous Nernst signal in cuprates, the
Nernst effect was explored in a variety of metals and superconductors during
the past few years. This paper reviews the results obtained during this
exploration, focusing on the Nernst response of normal quasi-particles as
opposed to the one generated by superconducting vortices or by short-lived
Cooper pairs. Contrary to what has been often assumed, the so-called Sondheimer
cancelation does not imply a negligible Nernst response in a Fermi liquid. In
fact, the amplitude of the Nernst response measured in various metals in the
low-temperature limit is scattered over six orders of magnitude. According to
the data, this amplitude is roughly set by the ratio of electron mobility to
Fermi energy in agreement with the implications of the semi-classical transport
theory.Comment: Final version, Topical review for JPC
Bose-Einstein condensation of strongly correlated electrons and phonons in cuprate superconductors
The long-range Froehlich electron-phonon interaction has been identified as
the most essential for pairing in high-temperature superconductors owing to
poor screening, as is now confirmed by optical, isotope substitution, recent
photoemission and some other measurements. I argue that low energy physics in
cuprate superconductors is that of superlight small bipolarons, which are
real-space hole pairs dressed by phonons in doped charge-transfer Mott
insulators. They are itinerant quasiparticles existing in the Bloch states at
low temperatures as also confirmed by continuous-time quantum Monte-Carlo
algorithm (CTQMC) fully taking into account realistic Coulomb and long-range
Froehlich interactions. Here I suggest that a parameter-free evaluation of Tc,
unusual upper critical fields, the normal state Nernst effect, diamagnetism,
the Hall-Lorenz numbers and giant proximity effects strongly support the
three-dimensional (3D) Bose-Einstein condensation of mobile small bipolarons
with zero off-diagonal order parameter above the resistive critical temperature
Tc at variance with phase fluctuation scenarios of cuprates.Comment: 35 pages, 10 figures, to appear in the special volume of Journal of
Physics: Condensed Matte
Quantum oscillations as the tool for study of new functional materials (Review Article)
We present an overview of our recent results on quantum magnetic oscillations in new functional materials. We begin with the Lifshitz and Kosevich approach for quasi-2D layered materials and obtain general formulas for the oscillatory parts of the grand thermodynamic potential and magnetization. Then we consider the oscillations
of the Nernst–Ettingshausen coefficient which consists of thermal and magnetization parts. The difference between normal and Dirac carriers is also discussed. To conclude we consider a model for multilayer graphene which allows to calculate exactly the Berry phase which remains undetermined in the Lifshitz–Kosevich approach. The magnetic oscillations of the density of states and capacitance for different number of the carbon layers are described