Lattice dynamical analogies and differences between SrTiO3 and EuTiO3 revealed by phonon-dispersion relations and double-well potentials

A comparative analysis of the structural phase transitions of EuTiO3 and SrTiO3 (at TS = 282 and 105 K, respectively) is made on the basis of phonon-dispersion and density functional calculations. The phase transition of EuTiO3 is predicted to arise from the softening of a transverse acoustic zone-boundary mode caused by the rotations of the TiO6 octahedra, as also found for the phase transition of SrTiO3. While the temperature dependence of the soft mode is similar in both compounds, their elastic properties differ drastically due to a large difference in the double-well potentials associated with the soft zone boundary-acoustic mode.

Comment on Isotope effect in multi-band and multi-channel attractive systems and inverse isotope effect in iron-based superconductors by T. Yanagisawa, et al

In a recent paper Yanagisawa et al. [1] claim from a theoretical analysis of a multi-channel multi-band superconductor model that an inverse isotope exponent on the superconducting transition temperature Tc can be realized in iron-based superconductors. Simultaneously, a subgroup of the authors of Ref. 1 performed the corresponding isotope effect experiment on (Ba, K)Fe2As2 by investigating the iron isotope exchange effect on Tc [2]. In accordance with their theoretical analysis they indeed report an unusually large sign reversed isotope exponent of {alpha} simeq -0.18(3) which is in strong contrast to previous experiments on the nominally same system with the same composition in Ba, K content, namely Ba0.6K0.4Fe2As2 [3], where the exponent was determined to be {alpha} simeq 0.37(3). This conflict remains unsolved until now with the exception of Ref. 4 where the iron isotope exponent has been determined for FeSe. In accordance with the results of Ref. 3 a large positive isotope exponent has been seen thus questioning the outcome of Ref. 1 and implicitly the findings of Ref. 2. Here, we do not comment on the controversial experimental situation but address the theoretical analysis of Ref. 1, where a variety of misleading assumptions have led to the conclusion that a sign reversed isotope exponent can be realized in a multi-band and multi-channel attractive model for iron based superconductors.