In-situ angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy of copper-oxide thin films synthesized by molecular beam epitaxy
Journal of Electron Spectroscopy and Related Phenomena (2018)
Abstract:
© 2018 Elsevier B.V. Angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) is the key momentum-resolved technique for direct probing of the electronic structure of a material. However, since it is highly surface-sensitive, it has been applied to a relatively small set of complex oxides that can be easily cleaved in ultra-high vacuum. Here we describe a new multi-module system at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) in which an oxide molecular beam epitaxy (OMBE) is interconnected with an ARPES and a spectroscopic-imaging scanning tunneling microscopy (SI-STM) module. This new capability largely expands the range of complex-oxide materials and artificial heterostructures accessible to these two most powerful and complementary techniques for studies of electronic structure of materials. We also present the first experimental results obtained using this system — the ARPES studies of electronic band structure of a La2-xSrxCuO4 (LSCO) thin film grown by OMBE.Orbital superconductivity, defects, and pinned nematic fluctuations in the doped iron chalcogenide FeSe0.45Te0.55
Physical Review B 96:6 (2017)
Abstract:
© 2017 American Physical Society. We demonstrate that the differential conductance, dI/dV, measured via spectroscopic imaging scanning tunneling microscopy in the doped iron chalcogenide FeSe0.45Te0.55, possesses a series of characteristic features that allow one to extract the orbital structure of the superconducting gaps. This yields nearly isotropic superconducting gaps on the two holelike Fermi surfaces, and a strongly anisotropic gap on the electronlike Fermi surface. Moreover, we show that the pinning of nematic fluctuations by defects can give rise to a dumbbell-like spatial structure of the induced impurity bound states, and explains the related C2 symmetry in the Fourier transformed differential conductance.Discovery of orbital-selective Cooper pairing in FeSe.
Science (New York, N.Y.) 357:6346 (2017) 75-80
Abstract:
The superconductor iron selenide (FeSe) is of intense interest owing to its unusual nonmagnetic nematic state and potential for high-temperature superconductivity. But its Cooper pairing mechanism has not been determined. We used Bogoliubov quasiparticle interference imaging to determine the Fermi surface geometry of the electronic bands surrounding the Γ = (0, 0) and X = (π/aFe, 0) points of FeSe and to measure the corresponding superconducting energy gaps. We show that both gaps are extremely anisotropic but nodeless and that they exhibit gap maxima oriented orthogonally in momentum space. Moreover, by implementing a novel technique, we demonstrate that these gaps have opposite sign with respect to each other. This complex gap configuration reveals the existence of orbital-selective Cooper pairing that, in FeSe, is based preferentially on electrons from the d yz orbitals of the iron atoms.Orbital selective pairing and gap structures of iron-based superconductors
Physical Review B 95:17 (2017)
Abstract:
© 2017 American Physical Society. We discuss the influence on spin-fluctuation pairing theory of orbital selective strong correlation effects in Fe-based superconductors, particularly Fe chalcogenide systems. We propose that a key ingredient for an improved itinerant pairing theory is orbital selectivity, i.e., incorporating the reduced coherence of quasiparticles occupying specific orbital states. This modifies the usual spin-fluctuation theory via suppression of pair scattering processes involving those less coherent states and results in orbital selective Cooper pairing of electrons in the remaining states. We show that this paradigm yields remarkably good agreement with the experimentally observed anisotropic gap structures in both bulk and monolayer FeSe, as well as LiFeAs, indicating that orbital selective Cooper pairing plays a key role in the more strongly correlated iron-based superconductors.Commensurate 4a0-period charge density modulations throughout the Bi2 Sr2 CaCu2 O8+x pseudogap regime
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 113:45 (2016) 12661-12666