Superconductivity, Magnetism, Quantum Criticality, And Hidden Order In Quantum Materials

Download or read book Superconductivity, Magnetism, Quantum Criticality, And Hidden Order In Quantum Materials written by Dom Lal Kunwar and published by . This book was released on 2022 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The heavy fermions (HF) are strongly correlated electron systems consisting of intermetallic compounds of lanthanides and actinides ions with f -electrons unfilled shells. These systems are very rich in physics and the interplay between competing interactions results in various interesting physical phenomena such as heavy fermion behavior, unconventional superconductivity, non-Fermi-liquid behavior, coexistence of superconductivity and magnetism, and quantum criticality. The origin of such phenomena comes from the interaction of itinerant conduction states with the partially filled 4f - or 5f -electron states of rare earth elements. The study of such important physical phenomena can be possible by tuning the system using nonthermal control parameters, such as chemical composition, magnetic field, and applied pressure. So, studying the chemical pressure effect on heavy fermion systems with or without magnetic field is an intriguing idea to construct various phase diagrams and study their phase transitions. We performed heat capacity (HC), magnetoresistance (MR), and resistivity measurements on the Ce-based 115 and U-based 122 heavy fermion materials at low temperatures. We studied the nature of the quantum critical point, second-order phase transition, and the possible interplay between superconductivity and magnetism. First, we were motivated by the possibility of observing the coexistence of magnetism and unconventional superconductivity in the heavy fermion Ce1-xSmxCoIn5 alloys. We performed specific heat, MR, and resistivity measurements in different magnetic fields. We investigated how the samarium substitution on the cerium site affects the magnetic-field-tuned quantum criticality of stoichiometric CeCoIn5. We have observed Fermi-liquid to non-Fermi-liquid crossovers in the temperature dependence of the electronic specific heat and resistivity at higher external magnetic fields. We obtained the magnetic-field-induced quantum critical point (HQCP) by extrapolating the crossover temperature to zero temperature. Furthermore, we performed a scaling analysis of the electronic specific heat and confirmed the existence of the QCP. According to our findings, the magnitude of (HQCP) decreases as the samarium content rises and ultimately becomes zero. The electronic specific heat and resistivity data reveal a zero-field QCP for xcr = 0.15, which falls inside the antiferromagnetic and superconducting coexistence region. Next, we performed measurements of the heat capacity as a function of temperature in a single crystals URu2-xOsxSi2. Our experimental results show that the critical temperature of the second-order phase transition increases while the value of the Sommerfeld coefficient in the ordered state decreases with an increase in osmium concentration. We also observed the increase in the magnitude of the heat capacity at the critical temperature and a broadening of the critical fluctuations region with an increase in Os concentration. We analyze the experimental data using the Haule- Kotliar model, which identifies the 'hidden order' transition in the parent material URu2Si2 as a transition to a state with nonzero hexadecapolar moment. We showed that our experimental results are consistent with this model. In conclusion, we studied the interplay between superconductivity and magnetism in Ce based 115 and U based 122 single crystal alloys using heat capacity, magnetoresistivity, and resistivity measurements in both cryogenic systems including He-4 and He-3. The understating of various phenomena in these heavy fermions could be helpful in developing higher transition temperature superconductors, energy storage devices, quantum computers, and memory devices in the future.