We propose that the driving force of an ultrafast crystalline-to-amorphous transition in phase-change memory alloys are strained bonds existing in the (metastable) crystalline phase. For the prototypical example of GST, we demonstrate that upon break
ing of long Ge-Te bond by photoexcitation Ge ion shot from an octahedral crystalline to a tetrahedral amorphous position by the uncompensated force of strained short bonds. Subsequent lattice relaxation stabilizes the tetrahedral surroundings of the Ge atoms and ensures the long-term stability of the optically induced phase.
We present recent advances in understanding of the ground and excited states of the electron-phonon coupled systems obtained by novel methods of Diagrammatic Monte Carlo and Stochastic Optimization, which enable the approximation-free calculation of
Matsubara Green function in imaginary times and perform unbiased analytic continuation to real frequencies. We present exact numeric results on the ground state properties, Lehmann spectral function and optical conductivity of different strongly correlated systems: Frohlich polaron, Rashba-Pekar exciton-polaron, pseudo Jahn-Teller polaron, exciton, and interacting with phonons hole in the t-J model.
