Prof Arzhang Ardavan

Abstract:

Fullerenes have attracted interest as materials for next-generation electronic devices. Considerable effort has been focused on the chemical functionalization of fullerenes. Fullerene dimers possess interesting photophysical effects. Herein we present an overview of our efforts on the synthesis and characterization of different types of fullerene dimers such as directly bonded dimers, a short chain C60 dimer and other dimers with bridge molecules of varying length. By choosing the bridge-molecule one can control the interfullerene spacing and thus tune the electronic interaction between the fullerenes. © 2007 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA.

Abstract:

We review recent progress towards implementing quantum information processing protocols using electron and nuclear magnetic resonance in the molecule N-14@C-60. Using conventional spectrometers, we measure the errors inherent in quantum manipulations of spins. By applying composite pulses, we correct the dominant error to a high degree. Identifying a two qubit computational basis out of the electron and oF nuclear spin levels of N-14@C-60, we implement an ultrafast phase gate on the nuclear qubit by exciting an electron spin transition. (c) 2007 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Abstract:

Fullerenes have attracted interest as materials for next-generation electronic devices. Considerable effort has been focused on the chemical functionalization of fullerenes. Fullerene dimers possess interesting photophysical effects. Herein we present an overview of our efforts on the synthesis and characterization of different types of fullerene dimers such as directly bonded dimers, a short chain C-60 dimer and other dimers with bridge molecules of varying length. By choosing the bridge-molecule one can control the interfullerene spacing and thus tune the electronic interaction between the fullerenes. (c) 2007 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Abstract:

On cooling through the transition temperature T(c) of a conventional superconductor, an energy gap develops as the normal-state charge carriers form Cooper pairs; these pairs form a phase-coherent condensate that exhibits the well-known signatures of superconductivity: zero resistivity and the expulsion of magnetic flux (the Meissner effect). However, in many unconventional superconductors, the formation of the energy gap is not coincident with the formation of the phase-coherent superfluid. Instead, at temperatures above the critical temperature a range of unusual properties, collectively known as 'pseudogap phenomena', are observed. Here we argue that a key pseudogap phenomenon-fluctuating superconductivity occurring substantially above the transition temperature-could be induced by the proximity of a Mott-insulating state. The Mott-insulating state in the kappa-(BEDT-TTF)2X organic molecular metals can be tuned, without doping, through superconductivity into a normal metallic state as a function of the parameter t/U, where t is the tight-binding transfer integral characterizing the metallic bandwidth and U is the on-site Coulomb repulsion. By exploiting a particularly sensitive probe of superconducting fluctuations, the vortex-Nernst effect, we find that a fluctuating regime develops as t/U decreases and the role of Coulomb correlations increases.