Condensed Matter Physics Seminar

Friday, March 12, 1999, 2 p.m.
Plant Sciences Building, Room 1130

Pseudogap state and order parameter phase fluctuations in underdoped cuprates

Hyok-Jon Kwon

(Department of Physics, University of Florida, Gainesville)

Abstract:  I discuss the role of order parameter phase fluctuations in the pseudogap phase of underdoped cuprates. The pseudogap state may be viewed as a superconductor where the phase coherence is destroyed by thermal phase fluctuations. I present a phenomenological low-energy theory to incorporate the fermion-phase field coupling in a two-dimensional superconductor and show the effects of vortex pair unbinding transition on fermion single-particle properties and the specific heat. I also discuss the possible zero-temperature analog of the pseudogap state where the quasiparticle fermions possess a d-wave gap. I show that a characteristic antiferromagnetic quantum phase transition may exist and is governed by long-ranged interaction induced by the gapless nodal quasiparticles.

Host: Victor Yakovenko


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