146 research outputs found
Extended paraconductivity regime in underdoped cuprates
We reconsider transport experiments in strongly anisotropic superconducting
cuprates and we find that universal Aslamazov-Larkin (AL) paraconductivity in
two dimensions is surprisingly robust even in the underdoped regime below the
pseudogap crossover temperature T^*. We also establish that the underlying
normal state resistivity in the pseudogap phase is (almost) linear in
temperature, with all the deviations being quantitatively accounted by AL
paraconductivity. The disappearence of paraconductivity is governed by the
disappearence of gaussian pair fluctuations at an energy scale related to T^*.Comment: 5 pages and 2 figure
BaCu3O4: High Temperature Magnetic Order in One-Dimensional S=1/2 Diamond-Chains
The magnetic properties of the alkaline earth oxocuprate BaCu3O4 are
investigated. We show that the characteristic Cu3O4 layers of this material can
be described with diamond chains of antiferromagnetically coupled Cu 1/2 spins
with only a weak coupling between two adjacent chains. These Cu3O4 layers seem
to represent a so far unique system of weakly coupled one-dimensional magnetic
objects where the local AF ordering of the Cu2+ ions leads to an actual net
magnetic moment of an isolated diamond chain. We demonstrate a magnetic
transition at a high N\'eel temperature T_{N}=336 K
Doping-dependent competition between superconductivity and polycrystalline charge density waves
From systematic analysis of the high pulsed magnetic field resistance data of
LaSrCuO thin films, we extract an experimental phase diagram
for several doping values ranging from the very underdoped to the very
overdoped regimes. Our analysis highlights a competition between charge density
waves and superconductivity which is ubiquitous between and
and produces the previously observed double step transition. When suppressed by
a strong magnetic field, superconductivity is resilient for two specific doping
ranges centered around respectively and and the
characteristic temperature for the onset of the competing charge density wave
phase is found to vanish above . At the two phases are found
to coexist exactly at zero magnetic field.Comment: 13 figures. Changes from previous version are in red. A few
clarifications and a discussion about the different materials were added
together with additional reference
Confinement of superconducting fluctuations due to emergent electronic inhomogeneities
The microscopic nature of an insulating state in the vicinity of a
superconducting state, in the presence of disorder, is a hotly debated
question. While the simplest scenario proposes that Coulomb interactions
destroy the Cooper pairs at the transition, leading to localization of single
electrons, an alternate possibility supported by experimental observations
suggests that Cooper pairs instead directly localize. The question of the
homogeneity, granularity, or possibly glassiness of the material on the verge
of this transition is intimately related to this fundamental issue. Here, by
combining macroscopic and nano-scale studies of superconducting ultrathin NbN
films, we reveal nanoscopic electronic inhomogeneities that emerge when the
film thickness is reduced. In addition, while thicker films display a purely
two-dimensional behaviour in the superconducting fluctuations, we demonstrate a
zero-dimensional regime for the thinner samples precisely on the scale of the
inhomogeneities. Such behavior is somehow intermediate between the Fermi and
Bose insulator paradigms and calls for further investigation to understand the
way Cooper pairs continuously evolve from a bound state of fermionic objects
into localized bosonic entities.Comment: 29 pages 9 figure
Phase Separation and the Phase Diagram in Cuprates Superconductors
We show that the main features of the cuprates superconductors phase diagram
can be derived considering the disorder as a key property of these materials.
Our basic point is that the high pseudogap line is an onset of phase separation
which generates compounds made up of regions with distinct doping levels. We
calculate how this continuous temperature dependent phase separation process
occurs in high critical temperature superconductors (HTSC) using the
Cahn-Hilliard approach, originally applied to study alloys. Since the level of
phase separation varies for different cuprates, it is possible that different
systems with average doping level pm exhibit different degrees of charge and
spin segregation. Calculations on inhomogeneous charge distributions in form of
stripes in finite clusters performed by the Bogoliubov-deGennes superconducting
approach yield good agreement to the pseudogap temperature T*(pm), the onset of
local pairing amplitudes with phase locked and concomitantly, how they develop
at low temperatures into the superconducting phase at Tc(pm) by percolation.Comment: 9 pages, 9 figures. Submitted to Phys. Rev.
Protected superconductivity at the boundaries of charge-density-wave domains
Solid 4He may acquire superfluid characteristics due to the frustration of the solid phase at grain boundaries. Here, introducing a negative-U generalized Hubbard model and a coarse-grained semiclassical pseudospin model, we show that an analogous effect occurs in systems with competition among charge-density-waves (CDW) and superconductivity in the presence of disorder, as cuprate or dichalcogenide superconductors. The CDW breaks apart in domains with topologically protected filamentary superconductivity at the interfaces. Our transport measurements, carried out in underdoped La2-x Sr x CuO4, with the magnetic field acting as a control parameter, are shown to be in excellent agreement with our theoretical prediction. Assuming superconductivity and CDW phases have similar energies, at intermediate temperatures, the magnetic field drives the system from a fluctuating superconductor to a CDW as expected in the clean limit. Lowering the temperature, the expected clean quantum critical point is avoided and a filamentary phase appears, analogous to 'glassy' supersolid phenomena in 4He. The transition line ends at a second quantum critical point at high-fields. Within our scenario, the filamentary superconducting phase is parasitic with CDW and bulk superconducting phases playing the role of primary competing order parameters
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