We present cluster-DMFT (CTQMC) calculations based on a downfolded tight-binding model in order to study the electronic structure of vanadium dioxide (VO_2) both in the low-temperature (M_1) and high-temperature (rutile) phases. Motivated by the recent efforts directed towards tuning the physical properties of VO_2 by depositing films on different supporting surfaces of different orientations we performed calculations for different geometries for both phases. In order to investigate the effects of the different growing geometries we applied both contraction and expansion for the lattice parameter along the rutile c-axis in the 3-dimensional translationally invariant systems miming the real situation. Our main focus is to identify the mechanisms governing the formation of the gap characterizing the M_1 phase and its dependence on strain. We found that the increase of the band-width with compression along the axis corresponding to the rutile c-axis is more important than the Peierls bonding-antibonding splitting.
Using the satellite structure of the $L_{gamma1}$ line in non-resonant x-ray emission spectra, we probe the high-pressure evolution of the bare 4f signature of the early light lanthanides at ambient temperature. For Ce and Pr the satellite peak experiences a sudden reduction concurrent with their respective volume collapse (VC) transitions. These new experimental results are supported by calculations using state-of-the-art extended atomic structure codes for Ce and Pr, and also for Nd, which does not exhibit a VC. Our work suggests that changes to the 4f occupation are more consistently associated with evolution of the satellite than is the reduction of the 4f moment. Indeed, we show that in the case of Ce, mixing of a higher atomic angular momentum state, driven by the increased hybridization, acts to obscure the expected satellite reduction. These measurements emphasize the importance of a unified study of a full set of microscopic observables to obtain the most discerning test of the underlying, fundamental f-electron phenomena at high pressures.
We present an implementation of the rotationally invariant slave boson technique as an impurity solver for density functional theory plus dynamical mean field theory (DFT+DMFT). Our approach provides explicit relations between quantities in the local correlated subspace treated with DMFT and the Bloch basis used to solve the DFT equations. In particular, we present an expression for the mass enhancement of the quasiparticle states in reciprocal space. We apply the method to the study of the electronic correlations in Sr$_2$RuO$_4$ under anisotropic strain. We find that the spin-orbit coupling plays a crucial role in the mass enhancement differentiation between the quasi-one-dimensional $alpha$ and $beta$ bands, and on its momentum dependence over the Fermi surface. The mass enhancement, however, is only weakly affected by either uniaxial or biaxial strain, even across the Lifshitz transition induced by the strain.
Doping and strain dependences of the electronic structure of the CuO6-octahedra layer within LDA+GTB method in the frameworks of six-band p-d model are calculated. Band structure and Fermi surface of the quasiparticle excitations in the effective Hubbard model are characterized by inhomogeneous distribution of the k-dependent spectral weight. Doping results in reconstruction of the band structure, redistribution of the spectral weight over dispersion surface and reconstruction of Fermi surface from small hole pockets in the underdoped region to large hole contour in the overdoped region through two quantum phase transitions (QPT). Strain increasing leads to displacement of the valence and conductivity bands, bandwidths decreasing and shift of the concentrations corresponding to QPTs. Strain dependences of the antiferromagnetic exchange coupling and DOS at the Fermi level determining superconducting temperature Tc are obtained. Effective exchange coupling in the equation for Tc demonstrates monotonic strain dependence.
Using the recently developed N-th order muffin-tin orbital-based downfolding technique in combination with the Dynamical Mean Field theory, we investigate the electronic properties of the much discussed Mott insulator TiOCl in the undimerized phase. Inclusion of correlation effects through this approach provides a description of the spectral function into an upper and a lower Hubbard band with broad valence states formed out of the orbitally polarized, lower Hubbard band. We find that these results are in good agreement with recent photo-emission spectra.
The correlated electronic structure of SrVO3 has been investigated by angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy using in-situ prepared thin films. Pronounced features of band renormalization have been observed: a sharp kink ~60 meV below the Fermi level (EF) and a broad so-called high-energy kink ~0.3 eV below EF as in the high-Tc cuprates although SrVO3 does not show magnetic fluctuations. We have deduced the self-energy in a wide energy range by applying the Kramers-Kronig relation to the observed spectra. The obtained self-energy clearly shows a large energy scale of ~0.7 eV which is attributed to electron-electron interaction and gives rise to the ~0.3 eV kink in the band dispersion as well as the incoherent peak ~1.5eV below EF. The present analysis enables us to obtain consistent picture both for the incoherent spectra and the band renormalization.