After an extended introduction, the thesis considers the electronic properties of BSCCO and the recent progress in understanding the electronic structure of this material. The main result of this part of the work is a model of the Green's function that is later used for calculating the two-particle excitation spectrum. Then, the matrix element effects in the photoemission spectra of cuprates are discussed with a focus on the recently discovered anomalous behavior of the ARPES spectra that partially originates from the momentum-dependent photoemission matrix element. The momentum- and excitation energy dependence of the anomalous high-energy dispersion, termed "waterfalls", is covered in full detail. Finally, the work describes the relation of ARPES with other experimental methods, such as INS spectroscopy. For the optimally doped bilayer Bi-based cuprate, the renormalized two-particle correlation function in the superconducting state is calculated from ARPES data within an itinerant model based on the random phase approximation (RPA). Additionally, two other applications of the same approach are briefly sketched: the relation of ARPES to FT-STS, and the nesting properties of Fermi surfaces in two-dimensional charge density wave compounds.
A new method for the analysis of the scattering rates from angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (ARPES) is presented and described in details. It takes into account experimental instrumental resolution and finite temperature effects. More accurate results are obtained in comparison with a standard, commonly used method. The application of the method is demonstrated for several examples commonly encountered in new quantum materials. Its usefulness is especially apparent in investigations of systems with strongly correlated electrons.
Present-day angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) has offered a tremendous advance in the understanding of electron energy spectra in cuprate superconductors and some related compounds. However, in high magnetic field, magnetic quantum oscillations at low temperatures indicate the existence of small electron (hole) Fermi pockets seemingly missing in ARPES of hole (electron) doped cuprates. Here ARPES and quantum oscillations are reconciled in the framework of an impurity band in the charge-transfer Mott-Hubbard insulator.
We present an Angle-Resolved PhotoElectron Spectroscopy study of the changes in the electronic structure of electron doped Ba(Fe(1-x)Co(x))2As2 across the superconducting phase transition. By changing the polarization of the incoming light, we were able to observe the opening of the gap for the inner hole pocket alpha, and to compare its behavior with the outer hole-like band beta. Measurements along high symmetry directions show that the behavior of beta is consistent with an isotropic gap opening, while slight anisotropies are detected for the inner band alpha. The implications of these resu…
Angle-resolved photoemission spectra present two challenges for the d-density wave (DDW) theory of the pseudogap state of the cuprates: (1) hole pockets near $(π/2,π/2)$ are not observed, in apparent contradiction with the assumption of translational symmetry breaking, and (2) there are no well-defined quasiparticles at the {\it antinodal} points, in contradiction with the predictions of mean-field theory of this broken symmetry state. Here, we show how these puzzles can be resolved.
This paper summarizes experimental results presented at the international conference honoring Prof. C.N. Yang's 80th birthday. I show seven examples that illustrate how one can use angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy to gain insights into the many-body physics responsible for the rich phase diagram of cuprate superconductors. I hope to give the reader a snapshot of the evolution of this experimental technique from a tool to study chemical bonds and band structure to an essential many-body spectroscopy for one of the most important physics problems of our time.
We amend ab initio strongly-correlated band structures by taking into account the band-tailing phenomenon in doped charge-transfer Mott-Hubbard insulators. We show that the photoemission from band tails accounts for sharp "quasi-particle" peaks, rapid loss of their intensities in some directions of the Brillouin zone ("Fermi-arcs") and high-energy "waterfall" anomalies as a consequence of matrix-element effects of disorder-localised states in the charge-transfer gap of doped cuprates.
We develop a novel self-consistent approach for studying the angle resolved photoemission spectra (ARPES) of a hole in the t-J-Holstein model giving perfect agreement with numerically exact Diagrammatic Monte Carlo data at zero temperature for all regimes of electron-phonon coupling. Generalizing the approach to finite temperatures we find that the anomalous temperature dependence of the ARPES in undoped cuprates is explained by cooperative interplay of coupling of the hole to magnetic fluctuations and strong electron-phonon interaction.
The unusual dispersion of electron states in antinodal direction for $n_{h}\simeq\frac{1}{8}$ holes/copper is explained. In photoelectron excitations, transformations of the $\mathbf{k}$ space as a consequence of symmetry breaking proves to be an exceptional phenomenon distinctly reflected by the experiments. Paired photoelectron emissions are predicted that enable a new energetic upward shift termed as \emph{pair shake-up effect} which explains the experimentally observed sharp transition between non-dispersive and dispersive behaviour. The disappearance of antinodal states for $\mathbf{k}_{|…
We propose a measurement scheme to directly detect odd-frequency superconductivity via time- and angle-resolved photoelectron fluctuation spectroscopy. The scheme includes two consecutive, non-overlapping probe pulses applied to a superconducting sample. The photoemitted electrons are collected in a momentum-resolved fashion. Correlations between signals with opposite momenta are analyzed. Remarkably, these correlations are directly proportional to the absolute square of the time-ordered anomalous Green's function of the superconductor. This setup allows for the direct detection of the "hidden…
This treatise reviews latest results obtained from angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) on cuprate superconductors, with a special focus on the electron-phonon interaction. What has emerged is rich information about the anomalous electron-phonon interaction well beyond the traditional views of the subject. It exhibits strong doping, momentum and phonon symmetry dependence, and shows complex interplay with the strong electron-electron interaction in these materials.
The pursuit of a comprehensive understanding of the dynamical nature of intertwined orders in quantum matter has fueled the development of several new experimental techniques, including time- and angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (TR-ARPES). In this regard, the study of copper-oxide high-temperature superconductors, prototypical quantum materials, has furthered both the technical advancement of the experimental technique, as well as the understanding of their correlated dynamical properties. Here, we provide a brief historical overview of the TR-ARPES investigations of cuprates, and re…
An attempt is made at reconciling the results of the prime experiments on the high temperature superconducting cuprates from Loram et al. and Davis et al. relating to electronic specific heat and to energy-resolved scanning tunnelling microscopy (STM), respectively, over the question of electronic inhomogeneity. I see the latter, at the appropriate level, as being essential to the evolution of HTSC in these materials, and try to bring into alignment the above key works, not only with each other, but with a wealth of related work. This is undertaken around a negative-U scenario long advocated b…
The angle-resolved photoemission (ARPES) technique has been developed rapidly over the last decay, accompanied by the improvement of energy and momentum resolutions. This technique has been established as the most powerful tool to investigate the high Tc cuprate superconductors. We review recent ARPES data on the cuprates from a theoretical point of view, with emphasis on the systematic evolution of the spectral weight near the momentum (pi,0) from insulator to overdoped systems. The effects of charge stripes on the ARPES spectra are also reviewed. Some recent experimental and theoretical effo…
We have investigated the doping and temperature dependences of the pseudogap/superconducting gap in the single-layer cuprate La$_{2-x}$Sr$_x$CuO$_4$ by angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy. The results clearly exhibit two distinct energy and temperature scales, namely, the gap around ($π$,0) of magnitude $Δ^*$ and the gap around the node characterized by the d-wave order parameter $Δ_0$, like the double-layer cuprate Bi2212. In comparison with Bi2212 having higher $T_c$'s, $Δ_0$ is smaller, while $Δ^*$ and $T^*$ are similar. This result suggests that $Δ^*$ and $T^*$ are approximately mate…
We have performed a systematic angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) study of the high-Tc cuprates La2-xSrxCuO4, ranging from the underdoped insulator to the superconductor to the overdoped metal. We have revealed a systematic doping evolution of the band dispersions and (underlying) Fermi surfaces, pseudogap and quasi-particle features under the influence of strong electron-electron interaction and electron-phonon interaction. The unusual transport and thermodynamic properties are explained by taking into account the pseudogap opening and the Fermi arc formation, due to which the …
With the aim at understanding the non-monotonic $d_{x^{2}-y^{2}}$-wave gap, we analyze the local electronic structure near impurities in the electron-doped cuprate superconductors. We find that the local density of states near a non-magnetic impurity in the scenario of $d_{x^{2}-y^{2}}$-wave superconductivity with higher harmonics is qualitatively different from that obtained from the $d_{x^{2}-y^{2}}$-wave superconductivity coexisting with antiferromagnetic spin density wave order. We propose that spin-polarized scanning tunneling microscopy measurements can distinguish the two scenarios and …
Angle-resolved photoemission measurements on the electron-doped cuprate Sm(1.85)Ce(0.15)CuO(4) evidence anisotropic dressing of charge-carriers due to many-body interactions. Most significantly, the scattering rate along the zone boundary saturates for binding energies larger than ~200 meV, while along the diagonal direction it increases nearly linearly with the binding energy in the energy range ~150-500 meV. These results indicate that many-body interactions along the diagonal direction are strong down to the bottom of the band, while along the zone-bounday they become very weak at energies …
We show theoretically that the measurement of a $\mathcal{PT}$-symmetric non-Hermitian superconductor by angle-resolved photoelectron fluctuation spectroscopy (ARPFS) provides a decisive signature. In fact, the signal is negative in a single-band case in contrast to the ARPFS signal of Hermitian superconductors. We suggest that the negative fluctuations can be explained by a remarkable pairing phenomenon: If the interaction between electrons in this $\mathcal{PT}$-symmetric non-Hermitian superconductor is attractive then the interaction between holes (i.e. missing electrons) is repulsive and v…
Using methods made possible by recent advances in photoemission technology, we perform an indepth line-shape analysis of the angle-resolved photoemission spectra of the electron doped (n-type) cuprate superconductor Nd_1.85Ce_0.15CuO_4. Unlike for the p-type materials, we only observe weak mass renormalizations near 50-70 meV. This may be indicative of smaller electron-phonon coupling or due to the masking effects of other interactions that make the electron-phonon coupling harder to detect. This latter scenario may suggest limitations of the spectral function analysis in extracting electronic…
We report a Cu K-edge resonant inelastic x-ray scattering (RIXS) study of high-Tc cuprates. Momentum-resolved charge excitations in the CuO2 plane are examined from parent Mott insulators to carrier-doped superconductors. The Mott gap excitation in undoped insulators is found to commonly show a larger dispersion along the [pi,pi] direction than the [pi,0] direction. On the other hand, the resonance condition displays material dependence. Upon hole doping, the dispersion of the Mott gap excitation becomes weaker and an intraband excitation appears as a continuum intensity below the gap at the s…
Angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) presents significant simplications in analyzing strictly two-dimensional (2D) materials, but even the most anisotropic physical systems display some residual three-dimensionality. Here we demonstrate how this third dimension manifests itself in ARPES spectra of quasi-2D materials by considering the example of the cuprate Bi$_2$Sr$_2$CaCu$_2$O$_{8}$ (Bi2212). The intercell, interlayer hopping, which is responsible for $k_z$-dispersion of the bands, is found to induce an irreducible broadening to the ARPES lineshapes with a characteristic depende…
To elucidate the nature of the single-particle excitations in the undoped parent cuprates, we have performed a detailed study of Ca2CuO2Cl2 using photoemission spectroscopy. The photoemission lineshapes of the lower Hubbard band are found to be well-described by a polaron model. By comparing the lineshape and temperature dependence of the lower Hubbard band with additional O 2p and Ca 3p states, we conclude that the dominant broadening mechanism arises from the interaction between the photohole and the lattice. The strength of this interaction was observed to be strongly anisotropic and may ha…
We have performed high resolution angle resolved photoemission (ARPES) studies on electron doped cuprate superconductors Sm2-xCexCuO4 (x=0.10, 0.15, 0.18), Nd2-xCexCuO4 (x=0.15) and Eu2-xCexCuO4 (x=0.15). Imaginary parts of the electron removal self energy show step-like features due to an electron-bosonic mode coupling. The step-like feature is seen along both nodal and anti-nodal directions but at energies of 50 and 70 meV, respectively, independent of the doping and rare earth element. Such energy scales can be understood as being due to preferential coupling to half- and full-breathing mod…
The recent angle-resolved photoemission measurements performed up to binding energies of the order of 1eV reveals a very robust feature: the nodal quasi-particle dispersion breaks up around 0.3-0.4eV and reappears around 0.6-0.8eV. The intensity map in the energy-momentum space shows a waterfall like feature between these two energy scales. We argue and numerically demonstrate that these experimental features follow naturally from the strong correlation effects built in the familiar t-J model, and reflect the connection between the fermi level and the lower Hubbard band. The results were obtai…
Recently, angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) has revealed a dispersion anomaly at high binding energy near 0.3-0.5eV in various families of the high-temperature superconductors. For further studies of this anomaly we present a new two-dimensional fitting-scheme and apply it to high-statistics ARPES data of the strongly-overdoped Bi2Sr2CuO6 cuprate superconductor. The procedure allows us to extract theself-energy in an extended energy and momentum range. It is found that the spectral function of Bi2Sr2CuO6 can be parameterized using a small set of tight-binding parameters and a w…
We study optimally doped Bi-2212 ($T_\textrm{c}=96$~K) using femtosecond time- and angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy. Energy-resolved population lifetimes are extracted and compared with single-particle lifetimes measured by equilibrium photoemission. The population lifetimes deviate from the single-particle lifetimes in the low excitation limit by one to two orders of magnitude. Fundamental considerations of electron scattering unveil that these two lifetimes are in general distinct, yet for systems with only electron-phonon scattering they should converge in the low-temperature, low-…
A recent angle resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (ARPES) study by Douglas et al. \cite {dessau-comment} on oxygen isotope exchanged Bi_2Sr_2CaCu_2O$_{8+δ}$ superconductors reported an absence of isotope effect at optimal doping, questioning the previous work by us \cite {gweon-nature}. Here, we report a new result that sheds light on this puzzling discrepancy as well as the nature of the electron lattice interaction in the cuprates: the anomalous isotope effect at optimal doping \cite {gweon-nature}, re-confirmed here, vanishes on a mere 2 % overdoping of holes. This result implies a rapid c…
Central issues in the electronic structure of underdoped cuprate superconductors are to clarify the shape of the Fermi surfaces and the origin of the pseudogap. On the basis of the model proposed by Kamimura and Suwa, which bears important features originating from the interplay of Jahn-Teller physics and Mott physics, the feature of Fermi surfaces in underdoped cuprates is the presence of Fermi pockets constructed from doped holes under the coexistence of a metallic state and a local antiferromagnetic order. Below $T_{\rm c}$, the holes on Fermi pockets form Cooper pairs with d-wave symmetry …
25 years after discovery of high-temperature superconductivity (HTSC) in La$_{2-x}$Ba$_x$CuO$_4$ (LBCO), the HTSC continues to pose some of the biggest challenges in materials science. Cuprates are fundamentally different from conventional superconductors in that the metallic conductivity and superconductivity are induced by doping carriers into an antiferromagnetically ordered correlated insulator. In such systems, the normal state is expected to be quite different from a Landau-Fermi liquid - the basis for the conventional BCS theory of superconductivity. The situation is additionally compli…
The experimental finding of an ubiquitous kink in the nodal direction of angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopies of superconducting cuprates has been reproduced theoretically. Our model is built upon the Migdal-Eliashberg theory for the electron self-energy within the phonon-coupling scenario. Following this perturbative approach, a numerical evaluation of the bare band dispersion energy in terms of the electron-phonon coupling parameter $λ$ allows a unified description of the nodal-kink effect. Our study reveals that distinction between $λ$ and the technically defined mass-enhancement par…
The normal state single particle spectral function of the high temperature superconducting cuprates, measured by the angle resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (ARPES), has been considered both anomalous and crucial to understand. Here we show that an unprecedentedly detailed description of the data is provided by a spectral function arising from the Extremely Correlated Fermi Liquid state of the t-J model proposed recently by Shastry. The description encompasses both laser and conventional synchrotron ARPES data on optimally doped Bi$_2$Sr$_2$CaCu$_2$O$_{8+δ}$, and also conventional synchrotro…
Using an energy-momentum dispersion for Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8 obtained from angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy we show that the shrinking Fermi arc model of the pseudogap is inconsistent with Raman scattering below Tc and specific heat near T*. By simulating the quasiparticle energy dispersion curves we show that Fermi arcs are an artifact of a T-dependent scattering rate.
Angle resolved photoelectron spectroscopic measurements have been performed on an insulating cuprate Ca_2CuO_2Cl_2. High resolution data taken along the Γto (pi,pi) cut show an additional dispersive feature that merges with the known dispersion of the lowest binding energy feature, which follows the usual strongly renormalized dispersion of ~0.35 eV. This higher energy part reveals a dispersion that is very close to the unrenormalized band predicted by band theory. A transfer of spectral weight from the low energy feature to the high energy feature is observed as the Γpoint is approached. By c…
Bulk crystals of electron-doped cuprates with the T'-type structure require both Ce substitutions and reduction annealing for the emergence of superconductivity while the reduction annealing alone can induce superconductivity in thin films of the T'-type cuprates. In order to reveal low-energy electronic states which are responsible for the superconductivity, we have conducted angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy measurements on thin films of the superconducting Ce-free T'-type cuprate Pr$_2$CuO$_4$. The results indicate that the overall band structure and the Fermi surface area of the su…
Inhomogeneous reduction-annealing effects on the electron-doped cuprate superconductor revealed by micro-focused angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy
We compute the finite-temperature single-particle spectral function of a one-dimensional Luttinger liquid coupled to an optical phonon band. The calculation is performed exactly for the case in which electron-phonon coupling is purely forward scattering. We extend the results to include backward scattering with a renormalization group treatment. The dispersion contains a change in velocity at the phonon energy, qualitatively similar to the case of electron-phonon coupling in a Fermi liquid. If the backward scattering part of the the electron-phonon interaction is not too strong compared to the…
In high-temperature superconductivity, the process that leads to the formation of Cooper pairs, the fundamental charge carriers in any superconductor, remains mysterious. We use a femtosecond laser pump pulse to perturb superconducting Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+δ, and study subsequent dynamics using time- and angle-resolved photoemission and infrared reflectivity probes. Gap and quasiparticle population dynamics reveal marked dependencies on both excitation density and crystal momentum. Close to the d-wave nodes, the superconducting gap is sensitive to the pump intensity and Cooper pairs recombine slowly.…
We present an overview of angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) studies of high-temperature cuprate superconductors aiming at elucidating the relationship between the superconductivity, the pseudogap, and the Fermi arc. ARPES studies of underdoped samples show a momentum dependence of the energy gap below Tc which deviates from a simple d-wave form, suggesting the coexistence of multiple energy scales in the superconducting state. Hence, two distinct energy scales have been introduced, namely, the gap near the node (characterized by Delta_0) and in the anti-nodal region (characteri…
The minimal ingredients to explain the essential physics of layered copper-oxide (cuprates= materials remains heavily debated. Effective low energy single-band models of the copper-oxygen orbitals are widely used because there exists no strong experimental evidence supporting multiband structures. Here we report angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy experiments on La-based cuprates that provide direct observation of a two-band structure. This electronic structure, qualitatively consistent with density functional theory, is parametrised by a two-orbital ($d_{x^2-y^2}$ and $d_{z^2}$) tight-b…
Expansion of Momentum Space and Full 2$π$ Solid Angle Photoelectron Collection in Laser-Based Angle-Resolved Photoemission Spectroscopy by Applying Sample Bias
Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院物理研究所）；University of Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院大学）；Technical Institute of Physics and Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences（中国科学院化学物理研究所）；Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory（松山湖材料实验室）
The nodal $d_{x^2-y^2}$ superconducting gap is a hallmark of the cuprate high T$_c$ superconductors. Surprisingly recent angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy of deeply underdoped cuprates revealed a nodeless energy gap which is adhered to the Fermi surface. Importantly this phenomenon is observed for compounds across several different cuprate families. In this letter we propose an exciting possibility, namely the fully gapped state is a topological superconductor.
We show how, within a preformed pair scenario for the cuprate pseudogap, the nodal and antinodal responses in angle resolved photoemission spectroscopy necessarily have very different temperature $T$ dependences. We examine the behavior and the contrasting $T$ dependences for a range of temperatures both below and above $T_c$. Our calculations are based on a fully microscopic $T$-matrix approach for addressing pairing correlations in a regime where the attraction is stronger than BCS and the coherence length is anomalously short. Previously, the distinct nodal and anti-nodal responses have pro…
One of the most puzzling features of high-temperature cuprate superconductors is the pseudogap state, which appears above the temperature at which superconductivity is destroyed. There remain fundamental questions regarding its nature and its relation to superconductivity. But to address these questions, we must first determine whether the pseudogap and superconducting states share a common property: particle-hole symmetry. We introduce a new technique to test particle-hole symmetry by using laser pulses to manipulate and measure the chemical potential on picosecond time scales. The results st…
Samples of Nd(2-x)Ce(x)CuO(4), an electron-doped high temperature superconducting cuprate (HTSC), near optimal doping at x = 0.155 were measured via angle resolved photoemission (ARPES). We report a renormalization feature in the self energy ("kink") in the band dispersion at 50 - 60 meV present in nodal and antinodal cuts across the Fermi surface. Specifically, while the kink had previously only been seen in the antinodal region, it is now observed also in the nodal region, reminiscent of what has been observed in hole-doped cuprates.
The angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) is one powerful experimental technique to study the electronic structure of materials. As many electron materials show unusual many-body correlations, the technique to detect directly these many-body correlations will play important roles in the study of their many-body physics. In this article, we propose a technique to detect directly the two-particle correlations, a coincidence ARPES (cARPES) where two incident photons excite two respective photoelectrons which are detected in coincidence. While the one-photon-absorption and one-photoele…
A major remaining challenge in the superconducting cuprates is the unambiguous differentiation of the composition and electronic structure of the CuO$_2$ layers and those of the intermediate layers. The large c axis for these materials permits employing soft x-ray (930.3 eV) standing wave (SW) excitation in photoemission that yields atomic layer-by-atomic layer depth resolution of these properties. Applying SW photoemission to Bi$_2$Sr$_2$CaCu$_2$O$_{8+δ}$ yields the depth distribution of atomic composition and the layer-resolved densities of states. We detect significant Ca presence in the Sr…
From recent Hall effect measurements and angle-resolved photo-emission spectroscopy the interesting picture emerges of co-existing hole- and electron-like quasiparticle bands, both in electron- and hole-doped superconducting cuprates. We reflect on the idea that bosonic electron-hole pairs may be formed in the cuprates and on the possibility that these pairs undergo Bose-Einstein condensation. The relevance to high-Tc superconductivity in the cuprates will be discussed.
We calculate the photoelectron escape depth in the high temperature superconductor Bi2212 by use of electron energy-loss spectroscopy data. We find that the escape depth is only 3 Ang. for photon energies typically used in angle resolved photoemission measurements. We then use this to estimate the number of inelastic secondaries, and find this to be quite small near the Fermi energy. This implies that the large background seen near the Fermi energy in photoemission measurements is of some other origin.
The $(π,π)$ shadow band (SB) in La-based cuprate family (La214) was studied by angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) over a wide doping range from $x=0.01$ to $x=0.25$. Unlike the well-studied case of the Bi-based cuprate family, an overall strong, monotonic doping dependence of the SB intensity at the Fermi level ($E_F$) was observed. In contrast to a previous report for the presence of the SB only close to $x=1/8$, we found it exists in a wide doping range, associated with a doping-independent $(π,π)$ wave vector but strongly doping-dependent intensity: It is the strongest at $x\…
The band structures of pure and hole doped La$_2$CuO$_4$ with antiferromagnetic (AFM) spin-fluctuations are calculated and compared to spectral weights of ARPES. It is shown that observations of coexisting Fermi surface (FS) arcs and closed FS pockets are consistent with modulated AFM spin fluctuations of varying wave lengths. Large variations of strong spin fluctuations make the outer part of the FS break diffuse at low doping. This part of the FS is suppressed at high doping when spin fluctuations are weak. The resulting superimposed spectral weight has features both from FS arcs and closed …
We investigate the doping dependent low energy, low temperature ($T$ = 5 K) properties of nodal quasiparticles in the d-wave superconductor Bi$_{2.1}$Sr$_{1.9}$CaCu$_2$O$_{8+δ}$ (Bi2212). By utilizing ultrahigh resolution laser-excited angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy, we obtain precise band dispersions near $E_{F}$, mean free paths and scattering rates ($Γ$) of quasiparticles. For optimally and overdoped, we obtain very sharp quasiparticle peaks of 8 meV and 6 meV full-width at half-maximum, respectively, in accord with terahertz conductivity. For all doping levels, we find the energ…
The nature of the pseudogap and its relationship with superconductivity are one of the central issues of cuprate superconductors. Recently, a possible scenario has been proposed that the pseudogap state is a distinct phase characterized by spontaneous rotational symmetry breaking called "nematicity" based on transport and magnetic susceptibility measurements, where the symmetry breaking was observed below the pseudogap temperature $T^*$. Here, we report a temperature-dependent ARPES study of nematicity in slightly overdoped Bi${}_{1.7}$Pb${}_{0.5}$Sr${}_{1.9}$CaCu${}_2$O${}_{8+δ}$ triggered by…
In high energy physics, the Higgs field couples to gauge bosons and fermions and gives mass to their elementary excitations. Experimentally, such couplings can be inferred from the decay product of the Higgs boson, i.e. the scalar (amplitude) excitation of the Higgs field. In superconductors, Cooper pairs bear a close analogy to the Higgs field. Interaction between the Cooper pairs and other degrees of freedom provides dissipation channel for the amplitude mode, which may reveal important information about the microscopic pairing mechanism. To this end, we investigate the Higgs (amplitude) mod…
This paper reviews the most recent ARPES results on the cuprate superconductors and their insulating parent and sister compounds, with the purpose of providing an updated summary of the extensive literature in this field. The low energy excitations are discussed with emphasis on some of the most relevant issues, such as the Fermi surface and remnant Fermi surface, the superconducting gap, the pseudogap and d-wave-like dispersion, evidence of electronic inhomogeneity and nano-scale phase separation, the emergence of coherent quasiparticles through the superconducting transition, and many-body e…
Nanoscale inhomogeneity seems to be a central feature of the d-wave superconductivity in the cuprates. Such a feature can strongly affect the local density of states (LDOS) and the spectral weight functions. Within the Bogoliubov-de Gennes formalism we examine various inhomogeneous configurations of the superconducting order parameter to see which ones better agree with the experimental data. Nanoscale large amplitude oscillations in the order parameter seem to fit the LDOS data for the underdoped cuprates. The one-particle spectral function for a general inhomogeneous configuration exhibits a…
We performed high-resolution angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy on triple-layered high-Tc cuprate Bi2Sr2Ca2Cu3O10+delta. We have observed the full energy dispersion (electron and hole branches) of Bogoliubov quasiparticles and determined the coherence factors above and below EF as a function of momentum from the spectral intensity as well as from the energy dispersion based on BCS theory. The good quantitative agreement between the experiment and the theoretical prediction suggests the basic validity of BCS formalism in describing the superconducting state of cuprates.
