Out of plane effect on the superconductivity of Sr2-xBaxCuO3+y with Tc up to 98K

A series of new Sr2-xBaxCuO3+y (0 x 0.6) superconductors were prepared using high-pressure and high-temperature synthesis. A Rietveld refinement based on powder x-ray diffraction confirms that the superconductors crystallize in the K2NiF4-type structure of a space group I4/mmm similar to that of La2CuO4 but with partially occupied apical oxygen sites. It is found that the superconducting transition temperature Tc of this Ba substituted Sr2CuO3+y superconductor with constant carrier doping level, i.e., constant d, is controlled not only by order/disorder of apical-O atoms but also by Ba content. Tcmax =98 K is achieved in the material with x=0.6 that reaches the record value of Tc among the single-layer copper oxide superconductors, and is higher than Tc=95K of Sr2CuO3+y with optimally ordered apical-O atoms. There is Sr-site disorder in Sr2-xBaxCuO3+y which might lead to a reduction of Tc. The result indicates that another effect surpasses the disorder effect that is related either to the increased in-plane Cu-O bond length or to elongated apical-O distance due to Ba substitution with larger cation size. The present experiment demonstrates that the optimization of local geometry out of the Cu-O plane can dramatically enhance Tc in the cuprate superconductors.Comment: 23 Pages, 1 Table, 5 Figure

Multiband effects on the conductivity for a multiband Hubbard model

The newly discovered iron-based superconductors have attracted lots of interests, and the corresponding theoretical studies suggest that the system should have six bands. In this paper, we study the multiband effects on the conductivity based on the exact solutions of one-dimensional two-band Hubbard model. We find that the orbital degree of freedom might enhance the critical value $U_c$ of on-site interaction of the transition from a metal to an insulator. This observation is helpful to understand why undoped High-$T_c$ superconductors are usually insulators, while recently discovered iron-based superconductors are metal. Our results imply that the orbital degree of freedom in the latter cases might play an essential role.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figure