Optical phonons in new ordered perovskite Sr2Cu(Re0.69Ca0.31) Oy system observed by infrared reflectance spectroscopy

We report infrared reflectivity spectra for a new correlated cupric oxide system Sr2Cu(Re0.69Ca0.31)Oy with y ~ 0.6 at several temperatures ranging between 8 and 380 K. The reflectivity spectrum at 300 K comprises of several optical phonons. A couple of residual bands located around 315 and 653 cm-1 exhibit exceptionally large intensity as compared to the other ones. The overall reflectivity spectrum lifts up slightly with increasing temperature. The energy and damping factor of transverse-optical phonons are determined by fitting the imaginary dielectric constant by Lorentz oscillator model and discussed as a function of temperature in terms of lattice anharmonicity.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures, presented at ISS2005, to appear in Physica

The energetics of giant radio galaxy lobes from inverse Compton scattering observations

Giant radio galaxy (GRG) lobes are excellent laboratories to study the evolution of the particle and B-field energetics. However, these results are based on assumptions of the shape and extension of the GRG lobe electron spectrum. We re-examine the energetics of GRG lobes as derived by inverse Compton scattering of CMB photons (ICS-CMB) by relativistic electrons in RG lobes to assess the physical conditions of RG lobes, their energetics and their radiation regime. We consider the GRG DA 240 recently observed by Suzaku as a reference case and we also discuss other RG lobes observed with Chandra and XMM. We model the spectral energy distribution of the DA 240 East lobe to get constraint on the shape and the extension of the electron spectrum in the lobe by using multi-frequency information from radio to gamma-rays. We use radio and X-ray data to constrain the shape and normalization of the electron spectrum and we then calculate the SZ effect expected in GRG lobes that is sensitive to the total electron energy density. We show that the electron energy density U_e derived form X-ray observations yields only a rough lower limit to its actual value and that most of the estimates of U_e based on X-ray measurements have to be increased even by a large factor by considering realistic estimates of the lower electron momentum p_1. This brings RG lobes away from the equipartition condition towards a particle-dominated and Compton power dominance regime. We use the distribution of RG lobes in the U_e/U_B vs. U_e/U_CMB plane as a further divide between different physical regimes of particle and field dominance, and radiation mechanism dominance in RG lobes. We conclude that the SZ effect produced by ICS-CMB mechanism observable in RG lobes provides reliable estimate of p_1 and U_e and is the best tool to determine the total energy density of RG lobes and to assess their physical regime.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figures, A&A in pres

New quantum critical points of j=3/2j=3/2 Dirac electrons in antiperovskite topological crystalline insulators

We study the effect of the long-range Coulomb interaction in $j=3/2$ Dirac electrons in cubic crystals with the $O_h$ symmetry, which serves as an effective model for antiperovskite topological crystalline insulators. The renormalization group analysis reveals three fixed points that are Lorentz invariant, rotationally invariant, and $O_h$ invariant. Among them, the Lorentz- and $O_h$-invariant fixed points are stable in the low-energy limit while the rotationally invariant fixed point is unstable. The existence of a stable $O_h$-invariant fixed point of Dirac fermions with finite velocity anisotropy presents an interesting counterexample to emergent Lorentz invariance in solids.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure

Theory of interacting topological crystalline insulators

We study the effect of electron interactions in topological crystalline insulators (TCIs) protected by mirror symmetry, which are realized in the SnTe material class and host multi-valley Dirac fermion surface states. We find that interactions reduce the integer classification of noninteracting TCIs in three dimensions, indexed by the mirror Chern number, to a finite group $Z_8$. In particular, we explicitly construct a microscopic interaction Hamiltonian to gap 8 flavors of Dirac fermions on the TCI surface, while preserving the mirror symmetry. Our construction builds on interacting edge states of $U(1)\times Z_2$ symmetry-protected topological (SPT) phases of fermions in two dimensions, which we classify. Our work reveals a deep connection between 3D topological phases protected by spatial symmetries and 2D topological phases protected by internal symmetries.Comment: v2. 10 pages, 3 figures. Added new materials and improved presentatio