905 research outputs found
Pressure-induced Superconductivity in CaLi2
A search for superconductivity has been carried out on the hexagonal
polymorph of Laves-phase CaLi2, a compound for which Feng, Ashcroft, and
Hoffmann predict highly anomalous behavior under pressure. No superconductivity
is observed above 1.10 K at ambient pressure. However, high-pressure ac
susceptibility and electrical resistivity studies to 81 GPa reveal bulk
superconductivity in CaLi2 at temperatures as high as 13 K. The normal-state
resistivity shows a dramatic increase with pressure.Comment: bulk superconductivity in CaLi2 now confirme
High pressure transport studies of the LiFeAs analogues CuFeTe2 and Fe2As
We have synthesized two iron-pnictide/chalcogenide materials, CuFeTe2 and
Fe2As, which share crystallographic features with known iron-based
superconductors, and carried out high-pressure electrical resistivity
measurements on these materials to pressures in excess of 30 GPa. Both
compounds crystallize in the Cu2Sb-type crystal structure that is
characteristic of LiFeAs (with CuFeTe2 exhibiting a disordered variant). At
ambient pressure, CuFeTe2 is a semiconductor and has been suggested to exhibit
a spin-density-wave transition, while Fe2As is a metallic antiferromagnet. The
electrical resistivity of CuFeTe2, measured at 4 K, decreases by almost two
orders of magnitude between ambient pressure and 2.4 GPa. At 34 GPa, the
electrical resistivity decreases upon cooling the sample below 150 K,
suggesting the proximity of the compound to a metal-insulator transition.
Neither CuFeTe2 nor Fe2As superconduct above 1.1 K throughout the measured
pressure range.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figure
Pressure-induced superconductivity in the giant Rashba system BiTeI
At ambient pressure, BiTeI is the first material found to exhibit a giant
Rashba splitting of the bulk electronic bands. At low pressures, BiTeI
undergoes a transition from trivial insulator to topological insulator. At
still higher pressures, two structural transitions are known to occur. We have
carried out a series of electrical resistivity and AC magnetic susceptibility
measurements on BiTeI at pressure up to ~40 GPa in an effort to characterize
the properties of the high-pressure phases. A previous calculation found that
the high-pressure orthorhombic P4/nmm structure BiTeI is a metal. We find that
this structure is superconducting with Tc values as high as 6 K. AC magnetic
susceptibility measurements support the bulk nature of the superconductivity.
Using electronic structure and phonon calculations, we compute Tc and find that
our data is consistent with phonon-mediated superconductivity.Comment: 7 pages, 7 figure
Alternative route to charge density wave formation in multiband systems
Charge and spin density waves, periodic modulations of the electron and
magnetization densities, respectively, are among the most abundant and
non-trivial low-temperature ordered phases in condensed matter. The ordering
direction is widely believed to result from the Fermi surface topology.
However, several recent studies indicate that this common view needs to be
supplemented. Here, we show how an enhanced electron-lattice interaction can
contribute to or even determine the selection of the ordering vector in the
model charge density wave system ErTe3. Our joint experimental and theoretical
study allows us to establish a relation between the selection rules of the
electronic light scattering spectra and the enhanced electron-phonon coupling
in the vicinity of band degeneracy points. This alternative proposal for charge
density wave formation may be of general relevance for driving phase
transitions into other broken-symmetry ground states, particularly in multiband
systems such as the iron based superconductors
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