Conventional aspects of 'unconventional' high temperature cuprate superconductors observed by scanning tunneling microscopy

Date

Dec 7, 2017

Time

3:00 PM - 4:00 PM

Speaker

Prof. Christoph Renner

Affiliation

Department of Quantum Matter Physics, University of Geneva, Switzerland

Language

en

Main Topic

Materialien

Other Topics

Materialien, Physik

Host

Christine Malbrich

Description

Abstract Superconductivity above liquid nitrogen temperature, considered impossible until its discovery in 1986, has been challenging the scientific community for over 30 years to explain its fundamental mechanism. High temperature superconductivity was first observed in an insulating oxide ceramic, very different from any superconducting material known at the time. These ceramics exhibit a number of unusual properties, both in the normal and in the superconducting state. We will discuss recent scanning tunneling microscopy experiments of YBa2Cu3O7-delta, the first compound whose resistance was found to collapse above 77 Kelvin. A detailed analysis of these latest scanning tunnelling spectroscopy data reveal that the superconducting condensate of YBa2Cu3O7-delta can be perfectly understood within a standard BCS model [1], including the Caroli–de Gennes–Matricon vortex core states [2] which have remained undetected so far. We show that the tunneling spectra look unconventional because superconducting electrons are minority and we discuss the impact of these findings on the understanding of the pseudogap phase and presumed competition between superconductivity and charge order. Collaboration with I. Maggio-Aprile, Ch. Berthod, J. Bruér, A. Erb [1] J. Bruér et al., Nat Commun 7, 11139 (2016) [2] Ch. Berthod et al., arXiv:1704.07685 (2017), to be published in PRL – Editor’s suggestion.

Links

• Seminars at the IFW

Last modified: Dec 7, 2017, 8:37:40 AM