Critical slowing down of fermions near a magnetic quantum phase transition

Fuente: arXiv
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Autori principali: Yang, Chia-Jung, Kliemt, Kristin, Krellner, Cornelius, Kroha, Johann, Fiebig, Manfred, Pal, Shovon
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2022
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author Yang, Chia-Jung
Kliemt, Kristin
Krellner, Cornelius
Kroha, Johann
Fiebig, Manfred
Pal, Shovon
author_facet Yang, Chia-Jung
Kliemt, Kristin
Krellner, Cornelius
Kroha, Johann
Fiebig, Manfred
Pal, Shovon
contents A universal phenomenon in phase transitions is critical slowing down (CSD) - systems, after an initial perturbation, take an exceptionally long time to return to equilibrium. It is universally observed in the dynamics of bosonic excitations, like order-parameter collective modes, but it is not generally expected to occur for fermionic excitations because of the half-integer nature of the fermionic spin. Direct observation of CSD in fermionic excitations or quasiparticles would therefore be of fundamental significance. Here, we observe fermionic CSD in the heavy-fermion (HF) compound YbRh$_2$Si$_2$ by terahertz time-domain spectroscopy. HFs are compound objects with a strongly enhanced effective mass, composed of itinerant and localized electronic states. We see that near the quantum phase transition in YbRh$_2$Si$_2$ the build-up of spectral weight of the HFs towards the Kondo temperature $T_K\approx 25$ K is followed by a logarithmic rise of the quasiparticle excitation rate on the heavy-Fermi-liquid side of the quantum phase transition below $10$ K. A critical two-band HF liquid theory shows that this is indicative of fermionic CSD. This CSD is a clear indication that the HF quasiparticles experience a breakdown near the quantum phase transition, and the critical exponent of this breakdown introduces a classification of fermionic quantum phase transitions analogous to thermodynamic phase transitions - solution to a long-standing problem.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2208_05932
institution arXiv
publishDate 2022
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Critical slowing down of fermions near a magnetic quantum phase transition
Yang, Chia-Jung
Kliemt, Kristin
Krellner, Cornelius
Kroha, Johann
Fiebig, Manfred
Pal, Shovon
Strongly Correlated Electrons
Optics
A universal phenomenon in phase transitions is critical slowing down (CSD) - systems, after an initial perturbation, take an exceptionally long time to return to equilibrium. It is universally observed in the dynamics of bosonic excitations, like order-parameter collective modes, but it is not generally expected to occur for fermionic excitations because of the half-integer nature of the fermionic spin. Direct observation of CSD in fermionic excitations or quasiparticles would therefore be of fundamental significance. Here, we observe fermionic CSD in the heavy-fermion (HF) compound YbRh$_2$Si$_2$ by terahertz time-domain spectroscopy. HFs are compound objects with a strongly enhanced effective mass, composed of itinerant and localized electronic states. We see that near the quantum phase transition in YbRh$_2$Si$_2$ the build-up of spectral weight of the HFs towards the Kondo temperature $T_K\approx 25$ K is followed by a logarithmic rise of the quasiparticle excitation rate on the heavy-Fermi-liquid side of the quantum phase transition below $10$ K. A critical two-band HF liquid theory shows that this is indicative of fermionic CSD. This CSD is a clear indication that the HF quasiparticles experience a breakdown near the quantum phase transition, and the critical exponent of this breakdown introduces a classification of fermionic quantum phase transitions analogous to thermodynamic phase transitions - solution to a long-standing problem.
title Critical slowing down of fermions near a magnetic quantum phase transition
topic Strongly Correlated Electrons
Optics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2208.05932