1,511 research outputs found
Evolution of optical properties of chromium spinels CdCrO, HgCrS, and ZnCrSe under high pressure
We report pressure-dependent reflection and transmission measurements on
ZnCrSe, HgCrS, and CdCrO single crystals at room
temperature over a broad spectral range 200-24000 cm. The pressure
dependence of the phonon modes and the high-frequency electronic excitations
indicates that all three compounds undergo a pressure-induced structural phase
transition with the critical pressure 15 GPa, 12 GPa, and 10 GPa for
CdCrO, HgCrS, and ZnCrSe, respectively. The
eigenfrequencies of the electronic transitions are very close to the expected
values for chromium crystal-field transitions. In the case of the chalcogenides
pressure induces a red shift of the electronic excitation which indicates a
strong hybridization of the Cr d-bands with the chalcogenide bands.Comment: Accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.
Chiral spin currents and spectroscopically accessible single merons in quantum dots
We provide unambiguous theoretical evidence for the formation of
correlation-induced isolated merons in rotationally-symmetric quantum dots. Our
calculations rely on neither the lowest-Landau-level approximation, nor on the
maximum-density-droplet approximation, nor on the existence of a spin-polarized
state. For experimentally accessible system parameters, unbound merons condense
in the ground state at magnetic fields as low as T and for as few
as N = 3 confined fermions. The four-fold degenerate ground-state at
corresponds to four orthogonal merons characterized by their
topological chirality and charge . This degeneracy is lifted by the
Rashba and Dresselhaus spin-orbit interaction, which we include perturbatively,
yielding spectroscopic accessibility to individual merons. We further derive a
closed-form expression for the topological chirality in the form of a chiral
spin current and use it to both characterize our states and predict the
existence of other topological textures in other regions of phase space, for
example, at N=5. Finally, we compare the spin textures of our numerically exact
meron states to ansatz wave-functions of merons in quantum Hall droplets and
find that the ansatz qualitatively describes the meron states.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figures; minor title change, typos fixe
Optical Properties of (SrMnO3)n/(LaMnO3)2n superlattices: an insulator-to-metal transition observed in the absence of disorder
We measure the optical conductivity of (SrMnO3)n/(LaMnO3)2n superlattices
(SL) for n=1,3,5, and 8 and 10 < T < 400 K. Data show a T-dependent insulator
to metal transition (IMT) for n \leq 3, driven by the softening of a polaronic
mid-infrared band. At n = 5 that softening is incomplete, while at the
largest-period n=8 compound the MIR band is independent of T and the SL remains
insulating. One can thus first observe the IMT in a manganite system in the
absence of the disorder due to chemical doping. Unsuccessful reconstruction of
the SL optical properties from those of the original bulk materials suggests
that (SrMnO3)n/(LaMnO3)2n heterostructures give rise to a novel electronic
state.Comment: Published Online in Nano Letters, November 8, 2010;
http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/nl1022628; 5 pages, 3 figure
Far-infrared absorption and the metal-to-insulator transition in hole-doped cuprates
By studying the optical conductivity of BSLCO and YCBCO, we show that the
metal-to-insulator transition (MIT) in these hole-doped cuprates is driven by
the opening of a small gap at low T in the far infrared. Its width is
consistent with the observations of Angle-Resolved Photoemission Spectroscopy
in other cuprates, along the nodal line of the k-space. The gap forms as the
Drude term turns into a far-infrared absorption, whose peak frequency can be
approximately predicted on the basis of a Mott-like transition. Another band in
the mid infrared softens with doping but is less sensitive to the MIT.Comment: To be published on Physical Review Letter
Pressure dependence of the Verwey transition in magnetite: an infrared spectroscopic point of view
We investigated the electronic and vibrational properties of magnetite at
temperatures from 300 K down to 10 K and for pressures up to 10 GPa by
far-infrared reflectivity measurements. The Verwey transition is manifested by
a drastic decrease of the overall reflectance and the splitting of the phonon
modes as well as the activation of additional phonon modes. In the whole
studied pressure range the down-shift of the overall reflectance spectrum
saturates and the maximum number of phonon modes is reached at a critical
temperature, which sets a lower bound for the Verwey transition temperature
T. Based on these optical results a pressure-temperature phase
diagram for magnetite is proposed.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures; accepted for publication in J. Appl. Phy
Low loss Ge-on-Si waveguides operating in the 8–14 µm atmospheric transmission window
Germanium-on-silicon waveguides were modeled, fabricated and characterized at wavelengths ranging from 7.5 to 11 µm. Measured waveguide losses are below 5 dB/cm for both TE and TM polarization and reach values of ∼ 1 dB/cm for ≥ 10 µm wavelengths for the TE polarization. This work demonstrates experimentally for the first time that Ge-on-Si is a viable waveguide platform for sensing in the molecular fingerprint spectral region. Detailed modeling and analysis is presented to identify the various loss contributions, showing that with practical techniques losses below 1 dB/cm could be achieved across the full measurement range
Optical properties of V2O3 in its whole phase diagram
Vanadium sesquioxide V2O3 is considered a textbook example of Mott-Hubbard
physics. In this paper we present an extended optical study of its whole
temperature/doping phase diagram as obtained by doping the pure material with
M=Cr or Ti atoms (V1-xMx)2O3. We reveal that its thermodynamically stable
metallic and insulating phases, although macroscopically equivalent, show very
different low-energy electrodynamics. The Cr and Ti doping drastically change
both the antiferromagnetic gap and the paramagnetic metallic properties. A
slight chromium content induces a mesoscopic electronic phase separation, while
the pure compound is characterized by short-lived quasiparticles at high
temperature. This study thus provides a new comprehensive scenario of the
Mott-Hubbard physics in the prototype compound V2O3
Evidence of a pressure-induced metallization process in monoclinic VO
Raman and combined trasmission and reflectivity mid infrared measurements
have been carried out on monoclinic VO at room temperature over the 0-19
GPa and 0-14 GPa pressure ranges, respectively. The pressure dependence
obtained for both lattice dynamics and optical gap shows a remarkable stability
of the system up to P*10 GPa. Evidence of subtle modifications of V ion
arrangements within the monoclinic lattice together with the onset of a
metallization process via band gap filling are observed for PP*. Differently
from ambient pressure, where the VO metal phase is found only in
conjunction with the rutile structure above 340 K, a new room temperature
metallic phase coupled to a monoclinic structure appears accessible in the high
pressure regime, thus opening to new important queries on the physics of
VO.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure
A combined experimental and computational study of the pressure dependence of the vibrational spectrum of solid picene C_22H_14
We present high-quality optical data and density functional perturbation
theory calculations for the vibrational spectrum of solid picene
(CH) under pressure up to 8 GPa. First-principles calculations
reproduce with a remarkable accuracy the pressure effects on both frequency and
intensities of the phonon peaks experimentally observed . Through a detailed
analysis of the phonon eigenvectors, We use the projection on molecular
eigenmodes to unambiguously fit the experimental spectra, resolving complicated
spectral structures, in a system with hundreds of phonon modes. With these
projections, we can also quantify the loss of molecular character under
pressure. Our results indicate that picene, despite a \sim 20 % compression of
the unit cell, remains substantially a molecular solid up to 8 GPa, with phonon
modes displaying a smooth and uniform hardening with pressure. The Grueneisen
parameter of the 1380 cm^{-1} a_1 Raman peak () is much lower
than the effective value () due to K doping. This is an
indication that the phonon softening in K doped samples is mainly due to charge
transfer and electron-phonon coupling.Comment: Replaced with final version (PRB
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