Electronic structure of CaFe2As2: Contribution of itinerant Fe 3d-states to the Fermi Level

Itinerant electron scenario for Fe-based superconductors

I review works on Fe-based superconductors which depart from a metal with well defined Fermi surfaces and Fermi liquid-type quasiparticles. I consider normal state instabilities -- SDW magnetism and nematic order, and superconductivity, all three as the consequences of the instability of a Fermi surface due to interactions between low-energy fermionic quasiparticles. This approach assumes that renormalizations coming from fermions from high energies, of order bandwidth, modify but do not destroy Fermi liquid behavior in the normal state and can be absorbed into the effective low-energy model o…

Evidence for Coexistence of Bulk Superconductivity and Itinerant Antiferromagnetism in the Heavy Fermion System CeCo(In$_{1-x}$Cd$_x$)$_5$

In the generic phase diagram of heavy fermion systems, tuning an external parameter such as hydrostatic or chemical pressure modifies the superconducting transition temperature. The superconducting phase forms a dome in the temperature-tuning parameter phase diagram, which is associated with a maximum of the superconducting pairing interaction. Proximity to antiferromagnetism suggests a relation between the disappearance of antiferromagnetic order and superconductivity. We combine muon spin rotation, neutron scattering, and x-ray absorption spectroscopy techniques to gain access to the magneti…

Approaching itinerant magnetic quantum criticality through a Hund's coupling induced electronic crossover in the YFe$_2$Ge$_2$ superconductor

Here, by conducting a systematic $^{89}$Y NMR study, we explore the nature of the magnetic ground state in a newly discovered iron-based superconductor YFe$_2$Ge$_2$. An incoherent-to-coherent crossover due to the Hund's coupling induced electronic correlation is revealed below the crossover temperature $T^*\sim 75\pm15\,\mathrm{K}$. During the electronic crossover, both the Knight shift ($K$) and the bulk magnetic susceptibility ($χ$) exhibit a similar nonmonotonic temperature dependence, and a so-called Knight shift anomaly is also revealed by a careful $K$-$χ$ analysis. Such an electronic c…

Itinerant Ferromagnetism in layered crystals LaCoOX (X = P, As)

The electronic and magnetic properties of cobalt-based layered oxypnictides, LaCoOX (X = P, As), are investigated. LaCoOP and LaCoOAs show metallic type conduction, and the Fermi edge is observed by hard x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Ferromagnetic transitions occur at 43 K for LaCoOP and 66 K for LaCoOAs. Above the transition temperatures, temperature dependence of the magnetic susceptibility follows the Curie-Weiss law. X-ray magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD) is observed at the Co L2,3-edge, but not at the other edges. The calculated electronic structure shows a spin polarized ground sta…

Genesis of coexisting itinerant and localized electrons in Iron Pnictides

We show how the general features of the electronic structure of the Fe-based high-Tc superconductors are a natural setting for a selective localization of the conduction electrons to arise. Slave-spin and Dynamical mean-field calculations support this picture and allow for a comparison of the magnetic properties with experiments.

Itinerant in-plane magnetic fluctuations and many-body correlations in Na$_x$CoO$_2$

Based on the {\it ab-initio} band structure for Na$_x$CoO$_2$ we derive the single-electron energies and the effective tight-binding description for the $t_{2g}$ bands using projection procedure. Due to the presence of the next-nearest-neighbor hoppings a local minimum in the electronic dispersion close to the $Γ$ point of the first Brillouin zone forms. Correspondingly, in addition to a large Fermi surface an electron pocket close to the $Γ$ point emerges at high doping concentrations. The latter yields the new scattering channel resulting in a peak structure of the itinerant magnetic suscept…

Itinerant and high-energy localized single-particle spectra in large-U$_d$ high-Tc cuprates

A theory of the underlying metallic state of large-U$_d$ high-Tc cuprates is presented starting from the covalent Cu-2O 3-band model associated with a sufficiently small copper occupancy. U$_d=\infty$ is dealt by the slave fermion approach. Diagrammatic low order NCA theory in terms of the Cu-O hopping is supplemented with two independent slave particle chemical potentials which implement the U(1) local gauge invariance "at average", thus avoiding the mean-field approximations. The resulting hole spectra consist of itinerant and localized states. The itinerant states close to the Fermi level a…

Direct measurement of the localized-itinerant transition, hybridization and antiferromagnetic transition of 5f electrons

In heavy-fermion compounds, f electrons show both itinerant and localized behaviour depending on the external conditions, and the hybridization between localized f electrons and itinerant conduction bands gives rise to their exotic properties like heavy-fermions, magnetic orders and unconventional superconductivity. Duo to the risk of handling radioactive actinide materials, the direct experimental evidence of the band structure evolution across the localized-itinerant and magnetic transitions for 5f electrons is lacking. Here, by using angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy, we revealed th…

Itinerant vibronic polarons: A Merrifield approach I. Low energy range calculations

We extend Merrifield's Variational Ansatz in the variational band theory of polarons to cover a frame of two electronic bands mixed by an Einstein phonon. The Hamiltonian is composed of the local and hopping energy terms, the vibrational energy, and a band-mixing term linear in the electron-phonon coupling. The eigenstate is a linear combination of Merrifield states in either electron band. The variational equations are solved numerically, so as to obtain the energy vs. momentum relation in ground state. Our variational method generates either Jahn-Teller polarons if the electronic bands degen…

光学晶格中费米子的阻挫诱导巡游铁磁性

Frustration induced Itinerant Ferromagnetism of Fermions in Optical Lattice

该研究指出阻挫晶格中单粒子基态在粒子-空穴变换下的双重简并引发能谷简并，并通过局域排斥相互作用导致的能谷 Hund 定则解释了近期实验观测到的金属铁磁关联，从而阐明了巡游铁磁性的新机制。