Resonant inelastic x-ray scattering in single-crystal superconducting PrFeAsO0.7

Resonant inelastic x-ray scattering (RIXS) spectra at the Fe K-edge were measured for a single crystal of the iron oxypnictide superconductor PrFeAsO0.7 (Tc=42 K). They disclose a weak, broad feature centered around 4.5 eV energy loss, which is slightly resonantly enhanced when the incident energy is tuned in the vicinity of the 4p white line. We tentatively ascribe it to the charge-transfer excitation between As 4p and Fe 3d.Comment: 2 pages, 2 figure

Charge-transfer energy in iridates: A hard x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy study

We have investigated the electronic structure of iridates in the double perovskite crystal structure containing either Ir4+ or Ir5+ using hard x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. The experimental valence band spectra can be well reproduced using tight-binding calculations including only the Ir 5d, O 2p, and O 2s orbitals with parameters based on the downfolding of the density-functional band structure results. We found that, regardless of the A and B cations, the A2BIrO6 iridates have essentially zero O 2p to Ir 5d charge-transfer energies. Hence double perovskite iridates turn out to be extremely covalent systems with the consequence being that the magnetic exchange interactions become very long ranged, thereby hampering the materialization of the long-sought Kitaev physics. Nevertheless, it still would be possible to realize a spin-liquid system using the iridates with a proper tuning of the various competing exchange interactions

Mixed-state Hall effect and flux pinning in Ba (Fe1-xCox) 2As2 single crystals (x = 0.08 and 0.10)

Longitudinal and Hall resistivities, scaling behavior, and magnetizations are examined to study the effect of flux pinning in Ba(Fe1-xCox)(2)As-2 (BFCA) single crystals with x = 0.08 and 0.01. Larger values of activation energy, critical current density, and pinning force are obtained in BFCA with x = 0.10, indicating relatively strong pinning. The sign reversal of Hall resistivities is clearly observed in BFCA with x = 0.10. The correlation between longitudinal and Hall resistivities shows the scaling behavior of rho(xy) proportional to (rho(xx))(beta) with exponents beta = 3.0-3.4 and 2.0+/-0.2 for BFCA crystals with x = 0.08 and 0.10, respectively. Furthermore, the normal-state Hall angle is also observed to follow cot theta(H) = Lambda T-2 + C in BFCA crystals, and is explained by the Anderson theory. The relatively large C/Lambda value for BFCA with x = 0.10 also implies a larger contribution of impurity scattering due to more Co atoms, which may cause stronger pinning of flux lines. The results are analyzed and coincide with theory, including the pinning-induced backflow effect and plastic flow mechanism in vortex dynamics

Static polarizability associated with multipole surface plasmons in metallic surfaces

An Euler-Lagrange-type equation is solved to different orders for aplane metallic system perturbed by the externa! operator Q used previously in a sum-rule calculation. This approach managed to reproduce to within a few percent the multipole surface-plasmon energies. The jellium model is used for the positive ionic background and local-density functionals for the Hamiltonian. From the zeroth-order Euler-Lagrange equation a self-consistent ground-state density is obtained and used in the first-order equation to obtain the induced density. From the induced density, several aspects of the system response are considered and special attention is focused on the static polarizability

Multipole surface-plasmon modes on simple metals

The average multipole surface-plasmon energy for simple metals, as well as that of ordinary surface and bulk plasmons, is obtained using energy-weighted moments of the electronic response to sufficiently general external perturbations. A local approximation of exchange and correlation effects is used within a jellium model. Band-structure effects are incorporated through an effective electronic mass. Taking advantage of the transparency of the method, we analyze under what circumstances such modes might be observable. It is shown that due to an interplay between Coulomb and kinetic energies, the multipole modes become unobservable for increasing values of the transferred momentum (q) parallel to the surface. The value of q at which the multipole mode becomes unobservable is much smaller than the cutoff value for Landau damping. The effect of the electronic surface diffuseness is also analyzed. We compare our results with previous density-functional calculations and with recent experimental data for Na, K, and Cs