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Quantum criticality at the superconductor to insulator transition revealed by specific heat measurements

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 نشر من قبل Aviad Frydman
 تاريخ النشر 2017
  مجال البحث فيزياء
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The superconductor-insulator transition (SIT) is considered an excellent example of a quantum phase transition which is driven by quantum fluctuations at zero temperature. The quantum critical point is characterized by a diverging correlation length and a vanishing energy scale. Low energy fluctuations near quantum criticality may be experimentally detected by specific heat, $c_{rm p}$, measurements. Here, we use a unique highly sensitive experiment to measure $c_{rm p}$ of two-dimensional granular Pb films through the SIT. The specific heat shows the usual jump at the mean field superconducting transition temperature $T_{rm c}^{rm {mf}}$ marking the onset of Cooper pairs formation. As the film thickness is tuned toward the SIT, $T_{rm c}^{rm {mf}}$ is relatively unchanged, while the magnitude of the jump and low temperature specific heat increase significantly. This behaviour is taken as the thermodynamic fingerprint of quantum criticality in the vicinity of a quantum phase transition.



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