Precursor Pairing Correlations and Pseudogaps

I begin by briefly reviewing various experimental results on the pseudogap phenomena in underdoped cuprates. I argue that, taken together, all of these lead to a picture of singlet pairing above $T_c$. I then explore the idea that the pseudogap is a normal state precursor of the superconducting gap due to local, dynamic pairing correlations in a state without long range phase coherence. Early work on simple model systems which exhibit pseudogap anomalies in the normal state of 2D superconductors in a low density, small pair size regime is reviewed and critically re-examined in view of more recent developments. I also describe recent studies of how the underlying d-wave superconducting ground state affects the anisotropy of the pseudogap and the destruction of the Fermi surface.Comment: 23 pages, 9 postscript figures, RevTex; Varenna Lectures, 199

Universal Short-Distance Structure of the Single-Particle Spectral Function of Dilute Fermi Gases

We show that the universal $1/k^4$ tail in the momentum distribution of dilute Fermi gases implies that the spectral function A(\kk,\omega) must have weight below the chemical potential for large momentum $k \gg k_F$, with observable consequences in RF spectroscopy experiments. We find that this incoherent spectral weight is centered about \omega \simeq - \epsilon(\kk) in a range of energies of order $v_F k$. This "bending back" in the dispersion, while natural for superfluids, is quite surprising for normal gases. This universal structure is present in the hard-sphere gas as well as the Fermi liquid ground state of the highly imbalanced, attractive gas near unitarity. We argue that, even in the BCS superfluid, this bending back at large $k$ is dominated by interaction effects which do not reflect the pairing gap.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

BCS-BEC Crossover and the Unitary Fermi Gas

The crossover from weak coupling Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) pairing to a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) of tightly bound pairs, as a function of the attractive interaction in Fermi systems, has long been of interest to theoretical physicists. The past decade has seen a series of remarkable experimental developments in ultracold Fermi gases that has realized the BCS-BEC crossover in the laboratory, bringing with it fresh new insights into the very strongly interacting unitary regime in the middle of this crossover. In this review, we start with a pedagogical introduction to the crossover and then focus on recent progress in the strongly interacting regime. While our focus is on new theoretical developments, we also describe three key experiments that probe the thermodynamics, transport and spectroscopy of the unitary Fermi gas. We discuss connections between the unitary regime and other areas of physics -- quark-gluon plasmas, gauge-gravity duality and high temperature superconductivity -- and conclude with open questions about strongly interacting Fermi gases.Comment: 33 pages, 6 figures. Invited article for Annual Reviews of Condensed Matter Physics. v3: Published versio

High Tc Superconductors: New Insights from Angle-Resolved Photoemission

Recent angle-resolved photoemission (ARPES) studies of the high Tc superconductors are reviewed. Amongst the topics discussed are: the spectral function interpretation of ARPES data and sum rules; studies of the momentum distribution and the Fermi surface (FS); dispersion of electronic states, flat bands and superlattice effects; unusual lineshapes and their temperature dependence; the question of bilayer splitting; detailed studies of the superconducting gap and its anisotropy; and, finally, studies of the pseudogap and evolution of the FS with doping in the underdoped materials.Comment: 18 pages, RevTex, 14 postscript figures; Varenna Lectures, 199

BCS-BEC crossover with unequal mass fermions

We investigate the crossover from BCS pairing to molecular BEC in an atomic gas with two fermion species with masses m_\up \ne m_\dn tuned through a Feshbach resonance. We present results for the T=0 equation of state as a function of the scattering length including the effects of Gaussian fluctuations about the mean field ground state. We compute the ground state energy as a function of m_\up/m_\dn at unitarity and find excellent agreement with the quantum Monte Carlo result for m_\up/m_\dn = 6.67 for a $^{40}$K-$^6$Li mixture. We show that the dimer scattering length in the BEC limit as a function of m_\up/m_\dn compares well with exact four-body results of Petrov {\it et al}. We also derive the condition for trapping frequencies to obtain an unpolarized gas in a harmonic trap.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Theory of Kerr and Faraday rotations and linear dichroism in Topological Weyl Semimetals

We consider the electromagnetic response of a topological Weyl semimetal (TWS) with a pair of Weyl nodes in the bulk and corresponding Fermi arcs in the surface Brillouin zone. We compute the frequency-dependent complex conductivities $\sigma_{\alpha\beta}(\omega)$ and also take into account the modification of Maxwell equations by the topological $\theta$-term to obtain the Kerr and Faraday rotations in a variety of geometries. For TWS films thinner than the wavelength, the Kerr and Faraday rotations, determined by the separation between Weyl nodes, are significantly larger than in topological insulators. In thicker films, the Kerr and Faraday angles can be enhanced by choice of film thickness and substrate refractive index. We show that, for radiation incident on a surface with Fermi arcs, there is no Kerr or Faraday rotation but the electric field develops a longitudinal component inside the TWS, and there is magnetic linear dichroism. Our results have implications for probing the TWS phase in various experimental systems

Strong correlations lead to protected low energy excitations in disordered d-wave superconductors

We show that strong correlations play a vital role in protecting low energy excitations in disordered high temperature superconductors. The impurity-induced low-energy density of states (DOS) is greatly reduced in the strongly correlated superconductor compared to d-wave Bogoliubov-deGennes theory. The gapless nodal quasiparticles, and the resulting `V' in the low-energy DOS, are much more robust against disorder compared to the large-gap antinodal excitations. We discuss the relevance of our results to angle-resolved photoemission and scanning tunneling spectroscopy experiments.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Quantum oscillations in a d-wave vortex liquid

The observation of quantum oscillations in underdoped cuprates has generated intense debate about the nature of the field-induced resistive state and its implications for the `normal state' of high T_c superconductors. Quantum oscillations suggest an underlying Fermi liquid state at high magnetic fields H and low temperatures, in contrast with the high-temperature, zero-field pseudogap state seen in spectroscopy. Recent heat capacity measurements show quantum oscillations together with a large and singular field-dependent suppression of the electronic density of states (DOS), which suggests a resistive state that is affected by the d-wave superconducting gap. We present a theoretical analysis of the electronic excitations in a vortex-liquid state, with short range pairing correlations in space and time, that is able to reconcile these seemingly contradictory observations. We show that phase fluctuations lead to large suppression of the DOS that goes like $\sqrt{H}$ at low fields, in addition to quantum oscillations with a period determined by a Fermi surface reconstructed by a competing order parameter.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figure

Ferromagnetic exchange, spin-orbit coupling and spiral magnetism at the LaAlO_3/SrTiO_3 interface

The electronic properties of the polar interface between insulating oxides is a subject of great current interest. An exciting new development is the observation of robust magnetism at the interface of two non-magnetic materials LaAlO_3 (LAO) and SrTiO_3 (STO). Here we present a microscopic theory for the formation and interaction of local moments, which depends on essential features of the LAO/STO interface. We show that correlation-induced moments arise due to interfacial splitting of orbital degeneracy. We find that gate-tunable Rashba spin-orbit coupling at the interface influences the exchange interaction mediated by conduction electrons. We predict that the zero-field ground state is a long-wavelength spiral and show that its evolution in an external field accounts semi-quantitatively for torque magnetometry data. Our theory describes qualitative aspects of the scanning SQUID measurements and makes several testable predictions for future experiments.Comment: 9 pages, 4 figures, a typo corrected from the previous versio

Charged fermions coupled to Z2\mathbb{Z}_2 gauge fields: Superfluidity, confinement and emergent Dirac fermions

We consider a 2+1 dimensional model of charged fermions coupled to a $\mathbb{Z}_2$ gauge field, and study the confinement transition in this regime. To elucidate the phase diagram of this model, we introduce a method to handle the Gauss law constraint within sign problem free determinantal quantum Monte Carlo, at any charge density. For generic charge densities, $\mathbb{Z}_2$ gauge fluctuations mediate pairing and the ground state is a gapped superfluid. Superfluidity also appears in the confined phase. This is reminiscent of the BCS-BEC crossover, except that a true zero temperature transition occurs here, with the maximum $T_c$ achieved near the transition. At half-filling also one obtains a large Fermi surface which is gapped at zero temperature. However, on increasing fermion hopping a $\pi$-flux phase is spontaneously generated, with emergent Dirac fermions that are stable against pairing. In contrast to a Fermi liquid of electrons, the change in Fermi surface volumes of the $\mathbb{Z}_2$ fermions occurs without the breaking of translation symmetry. Unexpectedly, the numerics indicate a single continuous transition between the deconfined Dirac phase and the confined superfluid, in contrast to the naive expectation of a split transition, where a gap to fermions precedes confinement.Comment: 16 pages, 14 figure