No Arabic abstract
Charge, spin, as well as lattice instabilities are investigated in isolated or weakly coupled chains of correlated electrons at quarter-filling. Our analysis is based on extended Hubbard models including nearest neighbor repulsion and Peierls coupling to lattice degrees of freedom. While treating the electronic quantum fluctuations exactly, the lattice structure is optimized self-consistently. We show that, generically, isolated chains undergo instabilities towards coexisting charge density waves (CDW) and bond order waves (BOW) insulating spin-gapped phases. The spin and charge gaps of the BOW-CDW phase are computed. In the presence of an interchain magnetic coupling spin density waves phases including a CDW or a BOW component are also found. Our results are discussed in the context of insulating charge transfer salts.
We discovered the chirality of charge density waves (CDW) in 1T-TiSe$_2$ by using scanning tunnelling microscopy (STM) and optical ellipsometry. We found that the CDW intensity becomes $I{a_1}:I{a_2}:I{a_3} = 1:0.7 pm 0.1:0.5 pm 0.1$, where $Ia_i$ (i =1, 2, 3) is the amplitude of the tunnelling current contributed by the CDWs. There were two states, in which the three intensity peaks of the CDW decrease textit{clockwise} and textit{anticlockwise} when we index each nesting vector in order of intensity in the Fourier transformation of the STM images. The chirality in CDW results in the three-fold symmetry breaking. Macroscopically, two-fold symmetry was indeed observed in optical measurement. We propose the new generalized CDW chirality $H_{CDW} equiv {boldmath $q_1$} cdot ({boldmath $q_2$}times {boldmath $q_3$})$, where ${boldmath $q_i$}$ are the nesting vectors, which is independent of the symmetry of components. The nonzero $H_{CDW}$ - the triple-${boldmath $q$}$ vectors do not exist in an identical plane in the reciprocal space - should induce a real-space chirality in CDW system.
We model driven two-dimensional charge-density waves in random media via a modified Swift-Hohenberg equation, which includes both amplitude and phase fluctuations of the condensate. As the driving force is increased, we find that the defect density first increases and then decreases. Furthermore, we find switching phenomena, due to the formation of channels of dislocations. These results are in qualitative accord with recent dynamical x-ray scattering experiments by Ringlandet al. and transport experiments by Lemay et al.
We investigated the lock-in transition of charge density waves (CDWs) in quasi-one-dimensional conductors, based on McMillans free energy. The higher-order umklapp terms play an essential role in this study. McMillans theory was extended by Nakanishi and Shiba in order to treat multiple CDW vectors. Although their theories were aimed at understanding CDWs in quasi-two-dimensional conductors, we applied them to the quasi-one-dimensional conductors, including K$_{0.3}$MoO$_3$, NbSe$_3$, and $m$-TaS$_3$, and confirmed its validity for these cases. Then we discussed our previous experimental result of $o$-TaS$_3$, which revealed the coexistence of commensurate and incommensurate states. We found that the coexistence of multiple CDW vectors is essential for the lock-in transition to occur in $o$-TaS$_3$. The even- and odd-order terms in the free energy play roles for amplitude development and phase modulation, respectively. Moreover, consideration of the condition of being commensurate CDWs allowed us to relate it with that of the weak localization in random media.
We have performed angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy on epitaxial VTe2 films to elucidate the relationship between the fermiology and charge-density waves (CDW). We found that a two-dimensional triangular pocket in 1 monolayer (ML) VTe2 is converted to a strongly warped quasi-one-dimensional (1D) Fermi surface in the 6ML counterpart, likely associated with the 1T-to-1T structural phase transition. We also revealed a metallic Fermi edge on the entire Fermi surface in 6ML at low temperature distinct from anisotropic pseudogap in 1ML, signifying a contrast behavior of CDW that is also supported by first-principles band-structure caluculations. The present result points to the importance of simultaneously controlling the structural phase and fermiology to manipulate the CDW properties in ultrathin transition-metal dichalcogenides.
We analyze the instability of an unpolarized uniform quantum plasma consisting of two oppositely charged fermionic components with varying mass ratios, against charge and spin density waves (CDWs and SDWs). Using density functional theory, we treat each component with the local spin density approximation and a rescaled exchange-correlation functional. Interactions between different components are treated with a mean-field approximation. In both two- and three-dimensions, we find leading unstable CDW modes in the second-order expansion of the energy functional, which would induce the transition to quantum liquid crystals. The transition point and the length of the wave-vector are computed numerically. Discontinuous ranges of the wave-vector are found for different mass ratios between the two components, indicating exotic quantum phase transitions. Phase diagrams are obtained and a scaling relation is proposed to generalize the results to two-component fermionic plasmas with any mass scale. We discuss the implications of our results and directions for further improvement in treating quantum plasmas.