1,538 research outputs found
Possible origin of 60-K plateau in the YBa2Cu3O(6+y) phase diagram
We study a model of YBa2Cu3O(6+y) to investigate the influence of oxygen
ordering and doping imbalance on the critical temperature Tc(y) and to
elucidate a possible origin of well-known feature of YBCO phase diagram: the
60-K plateau. Focusing on "phase only" description of the high-temperature
superconducting system in terms of collective variables we utilize a
three-dimensional semi microscopic XY model with two-component vectors that
involve phase variables and adjustable parameters representing microscopic
phase stiffnesses. The model captures characteristic energy scales present in
YBCO and allows for strong anisotropy within basal planes to simulate oxygen
ordering. Applying spherical closure relation we have solved the phase XY model
with the help of transfer matrix method and calculated Tc for chosen system
parameters. Furthermore, we investigate the influence of oxygen ordering and
doping imbalance on the shape of YBCO phase diagram. We find it unlikely that
oxygen ordering alone can be responsible for the existence of 60-K plateau.
Relying on experimental data unveiling that oxygen doping of YBCO may introduce
significant charge imbalance between CuO2 planes and other sites, we show that
simultaneously the former are underdoped, while the latter -- strongly
overdoped almost in the whole region of oxygen doping in which YBCO is
superconducting. As a result, while oxygen content is increased, this provides
two counter acting factors, which possibly lead to rise of 60K plateau.
Additionally, our result can provide an important contribution to understanding
of experimental data supporting existence of multicomponent superconductivity
in YBCO.Comment: 9 pages, 8 figures, submitted to PRB, see http://prb.aps.or
Universal scaling for the spin-electricity conversion on surface states of topological insulators
We have investigated spin-electricity conversion on surface states of
bulk-insulating topological insulator (TI) materials using a spin pumping
technique. The sample structure is Ni-Fe|Cu|TI trilayers, in which magnetic
proximity effects on the TI surfaces are negligibly small owing to the inserted
Cu layer. Voltage signals produced by the spin-electricity conversion are
clearly observed, and enhanced with decreasing temperature in line with the
dominated surface transport at lower temperatures. The efficiency of the
spin-electricity conversion is greater for TI samples with higher resistivity
of bulk states and longer mean free path of surface states, consistent with the
surface spin-electricity conversion
Pitfalls in the analysis of low-temperature thermal conductivity of high-Tc cuprates
Recently, it was proposed that phonons are specularly reflected below about
0.5 K in ordinary single-crystal samples of high-T_c cuprates, and that the
low-temperature thermal conductivity should be analyzed by fitting the data up
to 0.5 K using an arbitrary power law. Such an analysis yields a result
different from that obtained from the conventional analysis, in which the
fitting is usually restricted to a region below 0.15 K. Here we show that the
proposed new analysis is most likely flawed, because the specular phonon
reflection means that the phonon mean free path \ell gets LONGER than the mean
sample width, while the estimated \ell is actually much SHORTER than the mean
sample width above 0.15 K.Comment: 4 pages, 1 figure; manuscript for the Proceedings of LEHTSC2007 to be
published in Journal of Physics: Conference Serie
Manipulation of Topological States and Bulk Band Gap Using Natural Heterostructures of a Topological Insulator
We have performed angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy on
(PbSe)5(Bi2Se3)3m, which forms a natural multilayer heterostructure consisting
of a topological insulator (TI) and an ordinary insulator. For m = 2, we
observed a gapped Dirac-cone state within the bulk-band gap, suggesting that
the topological interface states are effectively encapsulated by block layers;
furthermore, it was found that the quantum confinement effect of the band
dispersions of Bi2Se3 layers enhances the effective bulk-band gap to 0.5 eV,
the largest ever observed in TIs. In addition, we found that the system is no
longer in the topological phase at m = 1, pointing to a topological phase
transition between m = 1 and 2. These results demonstrate that utilization of
naturally-occurring heterostructures is a new promising strategy for realizing
exotic quantum phenomena and device applications of TIs.Comment: 5 pages, 5 figure
High resolution quantum sensing with shaped control pulses
We investigate the application of amplitude-shaped control pulses for
enhancing the time and frequency resolution of multipulse quantum sensing
sequences. Using the electronic spin of a single nitrogen vacancy center in
diamond and up to 10,000 coherent microwave pulses with a cosine square
envelope, we demonstrate 0.6 ps timing resolution for the interpulse delay.
This represents a refinement by over 3 orders of magnitude compared to the 2 ns
hardware sampling. We apply the method for the detection of external AC
magnetic fields and nuclear magnetic resonance signals of carbon-13 spins with
high spectral resolution. Our method is simple to implement and especially
useful for quantum applications that require fast phase gates, many control
pulses, and high fidelity.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, plus supplemental materia
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