Locally probing the hidden order in URu2Si2 by impurity doping
- Los Alamos National Laboratory
Impurity atoms in materials with strong electron-electron correlations can produce dramatic effects on the ground state electronic configuration. The strongly correlated system URu{sub 2}Si{sub 2} exhibits a broken symmetry ground state whose nature has eluded researchers for more than two decades. Below a transition temperature T{sub 0} {approx} 17.5 K, the electrons condense into a new phase of matter with a symmetry that does not couple to conventional spin or charge probes. The emergence of this hidden order parameter is accompanied by the development of a partial gap in the single particle density of states, which can be detected through measurements of the electronic specific heat. Here we report nuclear magnetic resonance spectra and spin lattice relaxation rates in URu{sub 2}Si{sub 2} doped with Rh impurities. Rh doping suppresses the hidden order and gives rise to local patches of antiferromagnetism, whose states have energies below the hidden order gap and are localized in regions where the hidden order parameter varies spatially. For sufficiently large Rh doping these local states percolate and completely suppress all long-range (hidden and antiferromagnetic) order. These observations of the local impurity states suggest that the hidden order is a spin pairing in the particle-hole channel.
- Research Organization:
- Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- DOE Contract Number:
- AC52-06NA25396
- OSTI ID:
- 960643
- Report Number(s):
- LA-UR-08-05622; LA-UR-08-5622; TRN: US201006%%1275
- Journal Information:
- Nature Physics, Journal Name: Nature Physics
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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