C-axis resistivity and high Tc superconductivity

Abstract

Recently we had proposed a mechanism for the normal-state C-axis resistivity of the high-T$_c$ layered cuprates that involved blocking of the single-particle tunneling between the weakly coupled planes by strong intra-planar electron-electron scattering. This gave a C-axis resistivity that tracks the ab-plane T-linear resistivity, as observed in the high-temperature limit. In this work this mechanism is examined further for its implication for the ground-state energy and superconductivity of the layered cuprates. It is now argued that, unlike the single-particle tunneling, the tunneling of a boson-like pair between the planes prepared in the BCS-type coherent trial state remains unblocked inasmuch as the latter is by construction an eigenstate of the pair annihilation operator. The resulting pair-delocalization along the C-axis offers energetically a comparative advantage to the paired-up trial state, and, thus stabilizes superconductivity. In this scheme the strongly correlated nature of the layered system enters only through the blocking effect, namely that a given electron is effectively repeatedly monitored (intra-planarly scattered) by the other electrons acting as an environment, on a time-scale shorter than the inter-planar tunneling time. Possible relationship to other inter-layer pairing mechanisms proposed by several workers in the field is also briefly discussed.