No Arabic abstract
In this work I investigate a two-band Hubbard model using the Gutzwiller wavefunction. The tight-binding part of the model was constructed to have a gapless spin-density wave state which leads to Dirac points in the bandstructure, a common feature of many iron-pnictide compounds. For quarter, half and three-quarter fillings I show that the Hunds rule coupling has a large impact on the metal-insulator transition in the paramagnetic phase. For the half-filled model in the antiferromagnetic phase, the magnetism evolves in a Stoner-like behavior and the size of the ordered moment is mainly determined by the Hubbard interaction. As the Hunds coupling plays a minor role in this state, the model does not describe a Hunds metal which is in contrast to more realistic models for iron-pnictide compounds.
We investigate multi-band Hubbard models for the three iron 3$d$-$t_{2g}$ bands and the two iron 3$d$-$e_g$ bands in ${rm La O Fe As}$ by means of the Gutzwiller variational theory. Our analysis of the paramagnetic ground state shows that neither Hartree--Fock mean-field theories nor effective spin models describe these systems adequately. In contrast to Hartree--Fock-type approaches, the Gutzwiller theory predicts that antiferromagnetic order requires substantial values of the local Hunds-rule exchange interaction. For the three-band model, the antiferromagnetic moment fits experimental data for a broad range of interaction parameters. However, for the more appropriate five-band model, the iron $e_g$ electrons polarize the $t_{2g}$ electrons and they substantially contribute to the ordered moment.
Following the discovery of the Fe-pnictide superconductors, LDA band structure calculations showed that the dominant contributions to the spectral weight near the Fermi energy came from the Fe 3d orbitals. The Fermi surface is characterized by two hole surfaces around the $Gamma$ point and two electron surfaces around the M point of the 2 Fe/cell Brillouin zone. Here, we describe a 2-band model that reproduces the topology of the LDA Fermi surface and exhibits both ferromagnetic and $q=(pi,0)$ spin density wave (SDW) fluctuations. We argue that this minimal model contains the essential low energy physics of these materials.
We study a two-orbital spin model to describe (pi,0) stripe antiferromagnetism in the iron pnictides. The double-spin model has an on-site Hundss coupling and inter-site interactions extending to second neighbors (inter- and intra-orbital) on the square lattice. Using a variational method based on a cluster decomposition, we optimize wave functions with up to 8 cluster sites (up to 2^16 variational parameters). We focus on the anomalously small ordered moments in the stripe state of the pnictides. To account for it, and large variations among different compounds, we show that the second-neighbor cross-orbital exchange constant should be ferromagnetic, which leads to partially hidden stripe order, with a moment that can be varied over a large range by small changes in the coupling constants. In a different parameter region, we confirm the existence of a canted state previously found in spin-wave theory. We also identify several other phases of the model.
We study a two-band Hubbard model using the dynamical mean-field theory combined with the exact diagonalization method. At the electron density $n=2$, a transition from a band-insulator to a correlated semimetal occurs when the on-site Coulomb interaction $U$ is varied for a fixed value of the charge-transfer energy $Delta$. At low temperature, the correlated semimetal shows ferromagnetism or superconductivity. With increasing doping $|n-2|$, the ferromagnetic transition temperature rapidly decreases and finally becomes zero at a critical value of $n$. The second-order phase transition occurs at high temperature, while a phase separation of ferromagnetic and paramagnetic states takes place at low temperature. The superconducting transition temperature gradually decreases and finally becomes zero near $n=1$ ($n=3$) where the system is Mott insulator which shows antiferromagnetism at low temperature.
Although the parent iron-based pnictides and chalcogenides are itinerant antiferromagnets, the use of local moment picture to understand their magnetic properties is still widespread. We study magnetic Raman scattering from a local moment perspective for various quantum spin models proposed for this new class of superconductors. These models vary greatly in the level of magnetic frustration and show a vastly different two-magnon Raman response. Light scattering by two-magnon excitations thus provides a robust and independent measure of the underlying spin interactions. In accord with other recent experiments, our results indicate that the amount of magnetic frustration in these systems may be small.