No Arabic abstract
Organic materials are believed to be potential superconductor with high transition temperature (TC). Organic superconductors mainly have two families: the quasi-one dimensional (TMTSF)2X and two dimensional (BEDT-TTF)2X (Ref. 1 and 2), in which TMTSF is tetramethyltetraselenafulvalene (C10H12Se4) and BEDT-TTF or ET is bis(ethylenedithio)tetrathiafulvalene (C10H8S8). One key feature of the organic superconductors is that they have {pi}-molecular orbitals, and the {pi}-electron can delocalize throughout the crystal giving rise to metallic conductivity due to a {pi}-orbital overlap between adjacent molecules. The introduction of charge into C60 solids and graphites with {pi}-electron networks by doping to realize superconductivity has been extensively reported3,4. Very recently, superconductivity in alkali-metal doped picene with {pi}-electron networks was reported5. Here we report the discovery of superconductivity in potassium doped Phenanthrene with TC~5 K. TC increases with increasing pressure, and the pressure of 1 GPa leads to an increase of 20% in TC, suggesting that the potassium doped phenanthrene shows unconventional superconductivity. Both phenanthrene and picene are polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and contain three and five fused benzene rings, respectively. The ribbon of fused benzene rings is part of graphene. Therefore, the discovery of superconductivity in K3Phenanthrene produces a novel broad class of superconductors consisting of fused hydrocarbon benzene rings with {pi}-electron networks. The fact that TC increases from 5 K for KxPhenanthrene with three benzene rings to 18 K for Kxpicene with five benzene rings suggests that such organic hydrocarbons with long benzene rings is potential superconductor with high TC.
We discover superconductivity in alkali-earth metals doped phenanthrene. The superconducting critical temperatures emph{T}$_c$ are 5.6 K and 5.4 K for Sr$_{1.5}$phenanthrene and Ba$_{1.5}$phenanthrene, respectively. The shielding fraction of Ba$_{1.5}$phenanthrene exceeds 65%. The Raman spectra show 8 cm$^{-1}$/electron and 7 cm$^{-1}$/electron downshifts for the mode at 1441 cm$^{-1}$ due to the charge transfer to organic molecules from the dopants of Ba and Sr. Similar behavior has been observed in A$_3$phenanthrene and A$_3$C$_{60}$(A = K and Rb). The positive pressure effect in Sr$_{1.5}$phenanthrene and Ba$_{1.5}$phenanthrene together with the lower $T_c$ with larger lattice indicates unconventional superconductivity in this organic system.
Recently a new family of Cr-based A2Cr3As3 (A = K, Rb, Cs) superconductors were reported, which own a rare quasi-one-dimensional (Q1D) crystal structure with infinite (Cr3As3)2- chains and exhibit intriguing superconducting characteristics possibly derived from spin-triplet electron pairing. The crystal structure of A2Cr3As3 is actually a slight variation of the hexagonal TlFe3Te3 prototype although they have different lattice symmetry. Here we report superconductivity in a 133-type KCr3As3 compound that belongs to the latter structure. The single crystals of KCr3As3 were prepared by the deintercalation of K ions from K2Cr3As3 crystals which were grown from a high-temperature solution growth method, and it owns a centrosymmetric lattice in contrast to the non-centrosymmetric K2Cr3As3. After annealing at a moderate temperature, the KCr3As3 crystals show bulk superconductivity at 5 K revealed by electrical resistivity, magnetic susceptibility and heat capacity measurements. The discovery of this KCr3As3 superconductor provides a different structural instance to study the exotic superconductivity in these Q1D Cr-based superconductors.
To realize topological superconductor is one of the most attracting topics because of its great potential in quantum computation. In this study, we successfully intercalate potassium (K) into the van der Waals gap of type II Weyl semimetal WTe2, and discover the superconducting state in KxWTe2 through both electrical transport and scanning tunneling spectroscopy measurements. The superconductivity exhibits an evident anisotropic behavior. Moreover, we also uncover the coexistence of superconductivity and the positive magneto-resistance state. Structural analysis substantiates the negligible lattice expansion induced by the intercalation, therefore suggesting K-intercalated WTe2 still hosts the topological nontrivial state. These results indicate that the K-intercalated WTe2 may be a promising candidate to explore the topological superconductor.
We report superconductivity in as synthesized Nb2PdSe5, which is similar to recently discovered Nb2PdS5 compound having very high upper critical field, clearly above the Pauli paramagnetic limit [Sci. Rep. 3, 1446 (2013)]. A bulk polycrystalline Nb2PdSe5 sample is synthesized by solid state reaction route in phase pure structure. The structural characterization has been done by X ray diffraction, followed by Rietveld refinements, which revealed that Nb2PdSe5 sample is crystallized in monoclinic structure with in space group C2/m. Structural analysis revealed the formation of sharing of one dimensional PdSe2 chains. Electrical and magnetic measurements confirmed superconductivity in Nb2PdSe5 compound at 5.5K. Detailed magneto-resistance results, exhibited the value of upper critical field to be around 8.2Tesla. The estimated Hc2(0) is within Pauli Paramagnetic limit, which is unlike the Nb2PdS5.
Since the discovery of copper oxide superconductor in 1986 [1], extensive efforts have been devoted to the search of new high-Tc superconducting materials, especially high-Tc systems other than cuprates. The recently discovered quaternary superconductor La[O1-xFx]FeAs with the superconducting critical transition Tc of 26 K [2], which has a much simple layered structure compared with cuprates, has attracted quick enthusiasm and is going to become a new high-Tc system [3-6]. Here we report the discovery of bulk superconductivity in the praseodymium-arsenide oxides Pr[O1-xFx]FeAs with an onset drop of resistivity as high as 52 K, and the unambiguous zero-resistivity and Meissner transition at low temperature, which will place these quaternary compounds to another high-Tc superconducting system explicitly.