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Title: The rate of quasiparticle recombination probes the onset of coherence in cuprate superconductors

Abstract

In the underdoped copper-oxides, high-temperature superconductivity condenses from a nonconventional metallic "pseudogap" phase that exhibits a variety of non-Fermi liquid properties. Recently, it has become clear that a charge density wave (CDW) phase exists within the pseudogap regime. This CDW coexists and competes with superconductivity (SC) below the transition temperature T c , suggesting that these two orders are intimately related. Here we show that the condensation of the superfluid from this unconventional precursor is reflected in deviations from the predictions of BSC theory regarding the recombination rate of quasiparticles. We report a detailed investigation of the quasiparticle (QP) recombination lifetime, τ qp , as a function of temperature and magnetic field in underdoped HgBa 2 CuO 4+δ (Hg-1201) and YBa 2 Cu 3 O 6+x (YBCO) single crystals by ultrafast time-resolved reflectivity. We find that τ qp (T) exhibits a local maximum in a small temperature window near T c that is prominent in underdoped samples with coexisting charge order and vanishes with application of a small magnetic field. We explain this unusual, non-BCS behavior by positing that T c marks a transition from phase-fluctuating SC/CDW composite order above to a SC/CDW condensate below. Our results suggest that themore » superfluid in underdoped cuprates is a condensate of coherently-mixed particle-particle and particle-hole pairs.« less

Authors:
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [3];  [4];  [5];  [5];  [5];  [5];  [6];  [7];  [7];  [7];  [3];  [5];  [8];  [8]
  1. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States); Univ. of California, San Diego, CA (United States)
  2. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
  3. Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States)
  4. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States)
  5. Univ. of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN (United States)
  6. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); North Carolina State Univ., Raleigh, NC (United States)
  7. Univ. of British Columbia, Vancouver (Canada); Canadian Inst. Adv. Res., Toronto, ON (Canada)
  8. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States)
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC), Menlo Park, CA (United States); Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES)
OSTI Identifier:
1252487
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1379285
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC02-76SF00515; SC0006858; AC02-05CH11231
Resource Type:
Journal Article: Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
Scientific Reports
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 6; Journal ID: ISSN 2045-2322
Publisher:
Nature Publishing Group
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
36 MATERIALS SCIENCE; 75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY; superconducting properties and materials

Citation Formats

Hinton, J. P., Thewalt, E., Alpichshev, Z., Mahmood, F., Koralek, J. D., Chan, M. K., Veit, M. J., Dorow, C. J., Barisic, N., Kemper, A. F., Bonn, D. A., Hardy, W. N., Liang, Ruixing, Gedik, N., Greven, M., Lanzara, A., and Orenstein, J. The rate of quasiparticle recombination probes the onset of coherence in cuprate superconductors. United States: N. p., 2016. Web. doi:10.1038/srep23610.
Hinton, J. P., Thewalt, E., Alpichshev, Z., Mahmood, F., Koralek, J. D., Chan, M. K., Veit, M. J., Dorow, C. J., Barisic, N., Kemper, A. F., Bonn, D. A., Hardy, W. N., Liang, Ruixing, Gedik, N., Greven, M., Lanzara, A., & Orenstein, J. The rate of quasiparticle recombination probes the onset of coherence in cuprate superconductors. United States. https://doi.org/10.1038/srep23610
Hinton, J. P., Thewalt, E., Alpichshev, Z., Mahmood, F., Koralek, J. D., Chan, M. K., Veit, M. J., Dorow, C. J., Barisic, N., Kemper, A. F., Bonn, D. A., Hardy, W. N., Liang, Ruixing, Gedik, N., Greven, M., Lanzara, A., and Orenstein, J. 2016. "The rate of quasiparticle recombination probes the onset of coherence in cuprate superconductors". United States. https://doi.org/10.1038/srep23610. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1252487.
@article{osti_1252487,
title = {The rate of quasiparticle recombination probes the onset of coherence in cuprate superconductors},
author = {Hinton, J. P. and Thewalt, E. and Alpichshev, Z. and Mahmood, F. and Koralek, J. D. and Chan, M. K. and Veit, M. J. and Dorow, C. J. and Barisic, N. and Kemper, A. F. and Bonn, D. A. and Hardy, W. N. and Liang, Ruixing and Gedik, N. and Greven, M. and Lanzara, A. and Orenstein, J.},
abstractNote = {In the underdoped copper-oxides, high-temperature superconductivity condenses from a nonconventional metallic "pseudogap" phase that exhibits a variety of non-Fermi liquid properties. Recently, it has become clear that a charge density wave (CDW) phase exists within the pseudogap regime. This CDW coexists and competes with superconductivity (SC) below the transition temperature T c , suggesting that these two orders are intimately related. Here we show that the condensation of the superfluid from this unconventional precursor is reflected in deviations from the predictions of BSC theory regarding the recombination rate of quasiparticles. We report a detailed investigation of the quasiparticle (QP) recombination lifetime, τ qp , as a function of temperature and magnetic field in underdoped HgBa 2 CuO 4+δ (Hg-1201) and YBa 2 Cu 3 O 6+x (YBCO) single crystals by ultrafast time-resolved reflectivity. We find that τ qp (T) exhibits a local maximum in a small temperature window near T c that is prominent in underdoped samples with coexisting charge order and vanishes with application of a small magnetic field. We explain this unusual, non-BCS behavior by positing that T c marks a transition from phase-fluctuating SC/CDW composite order above to a SC/CDW condensate below. Our results suggest that the superfluid in underdoped cuprates is a condensate of coherently-mixed particle-particle and particle-hole pairs.},
doi = {10.1038/srep23610},
url = {https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1252487}, journal = {Scientific Reports},
issn = {2045-2322},
number = ,
volume = 6,
place = {United States},
year = {Wed Apr 13 00:00:00 EDT 2016},
month = {Wed Apr 13 00:00:00 EDT 2016}
}

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Cited by: 25 works
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Works referenced in this record:

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journal, April 2010


Charge Order Driven by Fermi-Arc Instability in Bi2Sr2-xLaxCuO6+ 
journal, December 2013


Femtosecond optical detection of quasiparticle dynamics in high- T c YBa 2 Cu 3 O 7 δ superconducting thin films
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Angular Fluctuations of a Multicomponent Order Describe the Pseudogap of YBa2Cu3O6+x
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Coherence Factors in a High-Tc Cuprate Probed by Quasi-Particle Scattering Off Vortices
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Atomic-scale electronic structure of the cuprate d-symmetry form factor density wave state
journal, October 2015


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Phenomenology of the low-energy spectral function in high- T c superconductors
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Resistive transition in superconducting films
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Coexistence of periodic modulation of quasiparticle states and superconductivity in Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+ 
journal, August 2003


Influence of optically quenched superconductivity on quasiparticle relaxation rates in Bi 2 Sr 2 CaCu 2 O 8 + δ
journal, October 2015


Single-quasiparticle stability and quasiparticle-pair decay in YBa 2 Cu 3 O 6.5
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Direct observation of competition between superconductivity and charge density wave order in YBa2Cu3O6.67
journal, October 2012


Charge order and its connection with Fermi-liquid charge transport in a pristine high-Tc cuprate
journal, December 2014


Charge-density-wave origin of cuprate checkerboard visualized by scanning tunnelling microscopy
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journal, December 2006


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Evidence for stripe correlations of spins and holes in copper oxide superconductors
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Magnetic-field-induced charge-stripe order in the high-temperature superconductor YBa2Cu3Oy
journal, September 2011


Charge order and its connection with Fermi-liquid charge transport in a pristine high-Tc cuprate
journal, December 2014


Coexistence of periodic modulation of quasiparticle states and superconductivity in Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+ 
journal, August 2003


Concepts relating magnetic interactions, intertwined electronic orders, and strongly correlated superconductivity
journal, October 2013


Ultrafast optical and far-infrared quasiparticle dynamics in correlated electron materials
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Kinetics of a Superconductor Excited with a Femtosecond Optical Pulse
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From a Single-Band Metal to a High-Temperature Superconductor via Two Thermal Phase Transitions
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Angular Fluctuations of a Multicomponent Order Describe the Pseudogap of YBa2Cu3O6+x
journal, March 2014


Tracking Cooper Pairs in a Cuprate Superconductor by Ultrafast Angle-Resolved Photoemission
text, January 2012


Works referencing / citing this record:

Hidden Pair-Density-Wave Order in Cuprate Superconductors
journal, January 2019


Percolative nature of the direct-current paraconductivity in cuprate superconductors
journal, September 2018


Collapse of superconductivity in cuprates via ultrafast quenching of phase coherence
journal, April 2018


Local particle-hole pair excitations by SU(2) symmetry fluctuations
journal, June 2017


Light-induced nonequilibrium response of the superconducting cuprate La 2 x Sr x CuO 4
journal, September 2019


Clocking the onset of bilayer coherence in a high- T c cuprate
journal, January 2017


Synchrotron x-ray scattering study of charge-density-wave order in HgBa 2 CuO 4 + δ
journal, October 2017


Synchrotron X-Ray Scattering Study of Charge-Density-Wave Order in $HgBa_{2}CuO_{4+δ}$
text, January 2017