Yaobo Huang

Asymmetry of collective excitations in electron- and hole-doped cuprate superconductors

Cuprate superconductors are created by adding electrons or holes to a ‘parent’ compound. They have dissimilar phase diagrams and the asymmetry is further highlighted by unexpected collective modes measured using resonant inelastic X-ray scattering.

Persistent high-energy spin excitations in iron-pnictide superconductors

Motivated by the premise that superconductivity in iron-based superconductors is unconventional and mediated by spin fluctuations, an intense research effort has been focused on characterizing the spin-excitation spectrum in the magnetically ordered parent phases of the Fe pnictides and chalcogenides. For these undoped materials, it is well established that the spin-excitation spectrum consists of sharp, highly dispersive magnons. The fate of these high-energy magnetic modes upon sizable doping with holes is hitherto unresolved. Here we demonstrate, using resonant inelastic X-ray scattering, that optimally hole-doped superconducting Ba(0.6)K(0.4)Fe(2)As(2) retains well-defined, dispersive high-energy modes of magnetic origin. These paramagnon modes are softer than, though as intense as, the magnons of undoped antiferromagnetic BaFe(2)As(2). The persistence of spin excitations well into the superconducting phase suggests that the spin fluctuations in Fe-pnictide superconductors originate from a distinctly correlated spin state. This connects Fe pnictides to cuprates, for which, in spite of fundamental electronic structure differences, similar paramagnons are present.

Ground-state oxygen holes and the metal–insulator transition in the negative charge-transfer rare-earth nickelates

The metal–insulator transition and the intriguing physical properties of rare-earth perovskite nickelates have attracted considerable attention in recent years. Nonetheless, a complete understanding of these materials remains elusive. Here we combine X-ray absorption and resonant inelastic X-ray scattering (RIXS) spectroscopies to resolve important aspects of the complex electronic structure of rare-earth nickelates, taking NdNiO3 thin film as representative example. The unusual coexistence of bound and continuum excitations observed in the RIXS spectra provides strong evidence for abundant oxygen holes in the ground state of these materials. Using cluster calculations and Anderson impurity model interpretation, we show that distinct spectral signatures arise from a Ni 3d8 configuration along with holes in the oxygen 2p valence band, confirming suggestions that these materials do not obey a conventional positive charge-transfer picture, but instead exhibit a negative charge-transfer energy in line with recent models interpreting the metal–insulator transition in terms of bond disproportionation.

Unconventional superconducting gap inNaFe0.95Co0.05Asobserved by angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy

We have performed high-resolution angle-resolved photoemission measurements on superconducting electron-doped NaFe0.95Co0.05As (T-c similar to 18 K). We observed a holelike Fermi surface around the zone center and two electronlike Fermi surfaces around the M point, which can be connected by the Q = (pi, pi) wave vector, suggesting that scattering over the near-nested Fermi surfaces is important in this 111 pnictide. Nearly isotropic superconducting gaps with sharp coherent peaks are observed below T-c on all three Fermi surfaces. Upon increasing temperature through T-c, the gap size shows little change while the coherence vanishes. Large ratios of 2 Lambda/k(B)T(c) similar to 8 are observed for all the bands, indicating a strong coupling in this system. These results are not expected from a classical phonon-mediated pairing mechanism.

Observation of an isotropic superconducting gap at the Brillouin zone centre of Tl0.63K0.37Fe1.78Se2

We performed a high-resolution angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy study on superconducting (SC) Tl0.63K0.37Fe1.78Se2 (T-c = 29 K) in the whole Brillouin zone (BZ). In addition to a nearly isotropic similar to 8.2 meV 2-dimensional (2D) SC gap (2 Delta/k(B)T(c) similar to 7) on quasi-2D electron Fermi surfaces (FSs) located around M(pi, 0, 0)-A(pi, 0, pi), we observe a similar to 6.2 meV isotropic SC gap (2 Delta/k(B)T(c) similar to 5) on the Z-centred electron FS that rules out any d-wave pairing symmetry and rather favors an s-wave symmetry. All isotropic SC gap amplitudes can be fit by a single-gap function derived from a local strong-coupling approach suggesting an enhancement of the next-nearest neighbor exchange interaction in the ferrochalcogenide superconductors. Copyright (C) EPLA, 2012

Experimental evidence of hourglass fermion in the candidate nonsymmorphic topological insulator KHgSb

Topological insulators (TIs) host novel states of quantum matter, distinguished from trivial insulators by the presence of nontrivial conducting boundary states connecting the valence and conduction bulk bands. Up to date, all the TIs discovered experimentally rely on the presence of either time reversal or symmorphic mirror symmetry to protect massless Dirac-like boundary states. Very recently, it has been theoretically proposed that several materials are a new type of TIs protected by nonsymmorphic symmetry, where glide-mirror can protect novel exotic surface fermions with hourglass-shaped dispersion. However, an experimental confirmation of such new nonsymmorphic TI (NSTI) is still missing. Using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy, we reveal that such hourglass topology exists on the (010) surface of crystalline KHgSb while the (001) surface has no boundary state, which is fully consistent with first-principles calculations. We thus experimentally demonstrate that KHgSb is a NSTI hosting hourglass fermions. By expanding the classification of topological insulators, this discovery opens a new direction in the research of nonsymmorphic topological properties of materials.Photoemission established KHgSb as a nonsymmorphic topological insulator, which hosts hourglass-shaped surface states. Topological insulators (TIs) host novel states of quantum matter characterized by nontrivial conducting boundary states connecting valence and conduction bulk bands. All TIs discovered experimentally so far rely on either time-reversal or mirror crystal symmorphic symmetry to protect massless Dirac-like boundary states. Several materials were recently proposed to be TIs with nonsymmorphic symmetry, where a glide mirror protects exotic surface fermions with hourglass-shaped dispersion. However, an experimental confirmation of this new fermion is missing. Using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy, we provide experimental evidence of hourglass fermions on the (010) surface of crystalline KHgSb, whereas the (001) surface has no boundary state, in agreement with first-principles calculations. Our study will stimulate further research activities of topological properties of nonsymmorphic materials.

Orbital characters determined from Fermi surface intensity patterns using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy

In order to determine the orbital characters on the various Fermi surface pockets of the Fe-based superconductors Ba0.6K0.4Fe2As2 and FeSe0.45Te0.55, we introduce a method to calculate photoemission matrix elements. We compare our simulations to experimental data obtained with various experimental configurations of beam orientation and light polarization. We show that the photoemission intensity patterns revealed from angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy measurements of Fermi surface mappings and energy-momentum plots along high-symmetry lines exhibit asymmetries carrying precious information on the nature of the states probed, information that is destroyed after the data symmetrization process often performed in the analysis of angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy data. Our simulations are consistent with Fermi surfaces originating mainly from the d(xy), d(xz), and d(yz) orbitals in these materials.

Three-component fermions with surface Fermi arcs in tungsten carbide

Topological Dirac and Weyl semimetals not only host quasiparticles analogous to the elementary fermionic particles in high-energy physics, but also have a non-trivial band topology manifested by gapless surface states, which induce exotic surface Fermi arcs1,2. Recent advances suggest new types of topological semimetal, in which spatial symmetries protect gapless electronic excitations without high-energy analogues3–11. Here, using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy, we observe triply degenerate nodal points near the Fermi level of tungsten carbide with space group

Structural phase transition associated with van Hove singularity in 5d transition metal compound IrTe2

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