An exact study of charge-spin separation, pairing fluctuations and pseudogaps in four-site Hubbard clusters

An exact study of charge-spin separation, pairing fluctuations and pseudogaps is carried out by combining the analytical eigenvalues of the four-site Hubbard clusters with the grand canonical and canonical ensemble approaches in a multidimensional parameter space of temperature (T), magnetic field (h), on-site interaction (U) and chemical potential. Our results, near the average number of electrons =3, strongly suggest the existence of a critical parameter U_{c}(T) for the localization of electrons and a particle-hole binding (positive) gap at U>U_{c}(T), with a zero temperature quantum critical point, U_{c}(0)=4.584. For U<U_{c}(T), particle-particle pair binding is found with a (positive) pairing gap. The ground state degeneracy is lifted at U>U_c(T) and the cluster becomes a Mott-Hubbard like insulator due to the presence of energy gaps at all (allowed) integer numbers of electrons. In contrast, for U< U_c(T), we find an electron pair binding instability at finite temperature near =3, which manifests a possible pairing mechanism, a precursor to superconductivity in small clusters. In addition, the resulting phase diagram consisting of charge and spin pseudogaps, antiferromagnetic correlations, hole pairing with competing hole-rich (=2), hole-poor (=4) and magnetic (=3) regions in the ensemble of clusters near 1/8 filling closely resembles the phase diagrams and inhomogeneous phase separation recently found in the family of doped high T_c cuprates.Comment: 10 pages, 7 figure

Electronic and thermal studies of Hubbard clusters and indium oxide based semiconductors: Exact and first principles methods

Electronic and thermal properties of repulsive Hubbard clusters with different topologies were studied using the eigenvalues from exact calculations. Computations which were focused on electron charge and spin pairing instabilities in a multi-parameter phase space, defined by temperature, magnetic field and chemical potential, lead to properties that are similar to correlated, inhomogeneous bulk systems. We have developed a new scheme using charge and spin susceptibilities to find these instabilities and crossovers. Statistical Mechanics techniques were used to investigate the low temperature behavior of these systems. The results provided important insights in to several many body problems in condensed matter physics. In the second part, we studied the effects of point defects including transition metal doping in indium oxide using Density Functional Theory based methods. Interstitial positions, oxygen vacancies and transition metal doping were central to the study. Our interest was to investigate the changes in conductivity, transparency and magnetism with the introduction of these point defects.

Spin-orbit coupling, electron transport and pairing instabilities in two-dimensional square structures

Rashba spin-orbit effects and electron correlations in the two-dimensional cylindrical lattices of square geometries are assessed using mesoscopic two-, three- and four-leg ladder structures. Here the electron transport properties are systematically calculated by including the spin-orbit coupling in tight binding and Hubbard models threaded by a magnetic flux. These results highlight important aspects of possible symmetry breaking mechanisms in square ladder geometries driven by the combined effect of a magnetic gauge field spin-orbit interaction and temperature. The observed persistent current, spin and charge polarizations in the presence of spin-orbit coupling are driven by separation of electron and hole charges and opposite spins in real-space. The modeled spin-flip processes on the pairing mechanism induced by the spin-orbit coupling in assembled nanostructures (as arrays of clusters) engineered in various two-dimensional multi-leg structures provide an ideal playground for understanding spatial charge and spin density inhomogeneities leading to electron pairing and spontaneous phase separation instabilities in unconventional superconductors. Such studies also fall under the scope of current challenging problems in superconductivity and magnetism, topological insulators and spin dependent transport associated with numerous interfaces and heterostructures