arXiv subjects

Tarapada Sarkar

Publications and source records attributed to Tarapada Sarkar.

16 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2025

Thermoelectric quantum oscillations and Zeeman splitting in topological Dirac semimetal BaAl$_{4}$

Three-dimensional topological semimetals hosting Dirac or Weyl fermions are a new kind of materials class in which conduction and valence bands cross each other. Such materials harbor a nontrivial Berry phase, which is an additional geometrical phase factor arising along the path of an adiabatic surface and can give rise to experimentally measurable quantities such as an anomalous Hall component. Here we report a systematic study of quantum oscillations of thermoelectric power in single crystals of the topological Dirac nodal-line semimetal BaAl$_{4}$. We show that the thermoelectric power (TEP) is a sensitive probe of the multiple oscillation frequencies in this material, with two of these frequencies shown to originate from the three-dimensional Dirac band. The detected Berry phase provides evidence of the angular dependence and non-trivial state under high magnetic fields. We also have probed the signatures of Zeeman splitting, from which we have extracted the Land\'e $g$-factor for this system, providing further insight into the non-trivial topology of this family of materials.

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arXiv2025

Dissecting coupled orders in a terahertz-driven electron-doped cuprate

The interplay between superconductivity and charge density wave has often been studied from an equilibrium point of view. For example, using static tuning knobs such as doping, magnetic field and pressure, superconductivity can be enhanced or suppressed. The resulting effect on the co-existing charge density wave order, if any, is judged by variations in its ground state properties such as the ordering temperature or the spatial correlation. Such an approach can be understood as coordinated static displacements of two coupled order parameters within a Ginzburg-Landau description, evincing their interplay as either co-operative or competing but does not provide further microscopic information about the interaction. In order to assess such information, we dynamically perturb both orders from equilibrium and observe their coupling directly in the time-domain. We show that high-field multicycle terahertz pulses drive both the Higgs amplitude fluctuations of the superconducting order as well as collective fluctuations of the charge order in an electron-doped cuprate, resulting in characteristic third harmonic generation. A notable time delay is manifested between their respective driven dynamics. We propose that this may signify the important energy scale describing their coupling or imply a terahertz field-depinned charge density wave that destroys macroscopic superconductivity. Our work demonstrates a holistic approach for investigating coupled superconducting and charge density wave orders, which may shed novel light on their intertwined presence and widespread fluctuations in many classes of unconventional superconductors.

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arXiv2021

A counterexample to the conjectured Planckian bound on transport

It has recently been conjectured that the transport relaxation rate in metals is bounded above by the temperature of the system. In this work, we discuss the transport phenomenology of overdoped electron-doped cuprates, which we show constitute an unambiguous counterexample to this putative "Planckian" bound, raising serious questions about the efficacy of the bound.

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arXiv2021

BCS $d$-wave behavior in the THz electrodynamic response of electron-doped cuprate superconductors

Although cuprate superconductors have been intensively studied for the past decades, there is no consensus regarding the microscopic origin of their superconductivity. In this work, we measure the low-energy electrodynamic response of slightly underdoped and overdoped La$_{2-x}$Ce$_x$CuO$_4$ thin films using time-domain terahertz (THz) spectroscopy to determine the temperature and field dependence of the superfluid spectral weight. We show that the temperature dependence obeys the relation \textit{n$_s$} $\propto$ $1-(T/T_c)^2$, typical for dirty limit BCS-like $d$-wave superconductors. Furthermore, the magnetic field dependence was found to follow a sublinear $\sqrt{B}$ form, which supports predictions based on a $d$-wave symmetry for the superconducting gap. These observations imply that the superconducting order in these electron-doped cuprates can be well described in terms of a disordered BCS $d$-wave formalism.

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arXiv2020

Anomalous normal state magnetotransport in an electron-doped cuprate

We report magnetoresistance and Hall angle measurements of the electron-doped cuprate La$_{2-x}$Ce$_x$CuO$_4$ over a wide range of dopings from $x = 0.08 - 0.17$. Above 100 K, we find an unconventional $\sim H^{3/2}$ magnetic field dependence of the magnetoresistance observed in all samples doped within the superconducting dome. Further, the measured magnetoresistance violates Kohler's rule. Given the ubiquity of this anomalous magnetoresistance at high temperatures above the superconducting dome, we speculate that the origin of this behavior is linked to the unusual $ρ\sim T^2$ resistivity observed over the same wide parameter range at high temperatures. We also find a strong doping dependence of the Hall angle with an unconventional temperature dependence of $\cot θ_H \sim T^{4}$ ($T^{2.5}$) for samples doped below (above) the Fermi surface reconstruction doping $x_{\text{FSR}} = 0.14$.

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arXiv2020

The Future of the Correlated Electron Problem

A central problem in modern condensed matter physics is the understanding of materials with strong electron correlations. Despite extensive work, the essential physics of many of these systems is not understood and there is very little ability to make predictions in this class of materials. In this manuscript we share our personal views on the major open problems in the field of correlated electron systems. We discuss some possible routes to make progress in this rich and fascinating field. This manuscript is the result of the vigorous discussions and deliberations that took place at Johns Hopkins University during a three-day workshop January 27, 28, and 29, 2020 that brought together six senior scientists and 46 more junior scientists. Our hope, is that the topics we have presented will provide inspiration for others working in this field and motivation for the idea that significant progress can be made on very hard problems if we focus our collective energies.

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arXiv2020

Strange Metallic Transport in the Antiferromagnetic Regime of Electron Doped Cuprates

We report magnetoresistance and Hall Effect results for electron-doped films of the high-temperature superconductor La$_{2-x}$Ce$_x$CuO$_4$ (LCCO) for temperatures from 0.7 to 45 K and magnetic fields up to 65 T. For x = 0.12 and 0.13, just below the Fermi surface reconstruction (FSR), the normal state in-plane resistivity exhibits a well-known upturn at low temperature. Our new results show that this resistivity upturn is eliminated at high magnetic field and the resistivity becomes linear-in-temperature from $\sim$ 40 K down to 0.7 K. The magnitude of the linear coefficient scales with Tc and doping, as found previously [1,2] for dopings above the FSR. In addition, the normal state Hall coefficient has an unconventional field dependence for temperatures below 50K. This anomalous transport data presents a new challenge to theory and suggests that the strange metal normal state is also present in the antiferromagnetic regime.

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arXiv2020

Resistivity saturation in an electron-doped cuprate

We report the observation of resistivity saturation in lightly doped ($x\sim 0.10)$ as-grown samples of the electron-doped cuprate La$_{2-x}$Ce$_x$CuO$_4$ (LCCO). The saturation occurs at resistivity values roughly consistent with the phenomenological Mott-Ioffe-Regel criterion once the low effective carrier density of these materials is included in the analysis. These results imply that, at least for light doping, the high-temperature metallic phase of these materials is not necessarily strange and may be understood as simply a low-density metal.

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arXiv2020

Ferromagnetic order beyond the superconducting dome in a cuprate superconductor

The cuprate high-temperature superconductors (HTSC) have been the subject of intense study for more than 30 years with no consensus yet on the underlying mechanism of the superconductivity. Conventional wisdom dictates that the mysterious and extraordinary properties of the cuprates arise from doping a strongly correlated antiferromagnetic (AFM) insulator (1,2). The highly overdoped cuprates$-$those beyond the dome of superconductivity (SC)--are considered to be conventional Fermi liquid metals (3). Here, we report the emergence of itinerant ferromagnetic order (FM) below 4K for doping beyond the SC dome in electron-doped La$_{2-x} $Ce$_x$CuO$_4$ (LCCO). The existence of this FM order is evidenced by negative, anisotopic and hysteretic magnetoresistance, hysteretic magnetization, and the polar Kerr effect, all of which are standard signatures of itinerant FM in metals (4,5). This surprising new result suggests that the overdoped cuprates are also influenced by electron correlations and the physics is much richer than that of a conventional Fermi liquid metal.

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arXiv2019

The Strange Metal State of the Electron-Doped Cuprates

An understanding of the high-temperature copper oxide (cuprate) superconductors has eluded the physics community for over thirty years, and represents one of the greatest unsolved problems in condensed matter physics. Particularly enigmatic is the normal state from which superconductivity emerges, so much so that this phase has been dubbed a "strange metal." In this article, we will review recent research into this strange metallic state as realized in the electron-doped cuprates with a focus on their transport properties. The electron-doped compounds differ in several ways from their more thoroughly studied hole-doped counterparts, and understanding these asymmetries of the phase diagram may prove crucial to developing a final theory of the cuprates. Most of the experimental results discussed in this review have yet to be explained and remain an outstanding challenge for theory.

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arXiv2018

Anomalous quantum criticality in the electron-doped cuprates

In the physics of condensed matter, quantum critical phenomena and unconventional superconductivity are two major themes. In electron doped cuprates, the low upper critical field allows one to study the putative QCP at low temperature and to understand its connection to the long standing problem of the origin of the high Tc superconductivity. Here we present measurements of the low temperature normal state thermopower (S) of the electron-doped cuprate superconductor La2-xCexCuO4 (LCCO) from x=0.11 to 0.19. We observe quantum critical S divided by T versus ln(1/T) behavior over an unexpectedly wide doping range x = 0.15 - 0.17 above the putative QCP (x=0.14) with a slope that scales monotonically with the superconducting transition temperature. The presence of quantum criticality over a wide doping range provides a new window on the criticality. The thermopower behavior also suggests that the critical fluctuations are linked with Tc. Above the superconductivity dome, at x=0.19, a conventional Fermi liquid S proportional to T behavior is found for T less than equal to 40 K.

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arXiv2018

Correlation between scale-invariant normal state resistivity and superconductivity in an electron-doped cuprate

An understanding of the normal state in the high-temperature superconducting cuprates is crucial to the ultimate understanding of the long-standing problem of the origin of the superconductivity itself. This so-called strange metal state is thought to be associated with a quantum critical point (QCP) hidden beneath the superconductivity(1,2). In electron-doped cuprates in contrast to hole-doped cuprates it is possible to access the normal state at very low temperatures and low magnetic fields to study this putative QCP and to probe the T~0 K state of these materials(3,4). We report measurements of the low temperature normal state magnetoresistance (MR) of the n-type cuprate system La2-xCexCuO4 (LCCO) and find that it is characterized by a linear-in-field behavior, which follows a scaling relation with applied field and temperature, for doping (x) above the putative QCP (x= 0.14)(5). This unconventional behavior suggests that magnetic fields probe the same physics that gives rise to the anomalous low-temperature linear-in-T resistivity(4). The magnitude of the linear MR decreases as Tc decreases and goes to zero at the end of the superconducting dome (x ~0.175) above which a conventional quadratic MR is found. These results show that there is a strong correlation between the quantum critical excitations of the strange metal state and the high-Tc superconductivity.

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arXiv2018

Anomalous normal state resistivity in superconducting $La_{2-x}Ce_xCuO_4$: Fermi liquid or strange metal?

We present experimental results for the in-plane resistivity of the electron-doped cuprate superconductor $La_{2-x}Ce_xCuO_4$ above its transition temperature $T_c$ as a function of Ce doping x and temperature. For the doping x between 0.11 and 0.17, where $T_c$ varies from 30 K (x=0.11) to 5 K (x=0.17), we find that the resistivity shows an approximate $T^2$ behavior for all values of doping over the measurement range from 100 K to 400 K. The coefficient of the $T^2$ resistivity term decreases with increasing x following the trend in $T_c$. We analyze our data theoretically and posit that n-type cuprates are better thought of as strange metals. Although the quadratic temperature dependence appears to be in naive agreement with the Fermi liquid (FL) expectations, the fact that the measured resistivity is large and no phonon-induced linear-in-T resistivity manifests itself even at 400 K argue against a standard normal metal Fermi liquid picture being applicable. We discuss possible origins of the strange metal behavior.

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arXiv2018

Quantum oscillations from the reconstructed Fermi surface in electron-doped cuprate superconductors

We have studied the electronic structure of electron-doped cuprate superconductors via measurements of high-field Shubnikov-de Haas oscillations in thin films. In optimally doped Pr$_{2-x}$Ce$_{x}$CuO$_{4\pmδ}$ and La$_{2-x}$Ce$_{x}$CuO$_{4\pmδ}$, quantum oscillations indicate the presence of a small Fermi surface, demonstrating that electronic reconstruction is a general feature of the electron-doped cuprates, despite the location of the superconducting dome at very different doping levels. Negative high-field magnetoresistance is correlated with an anomalous low-temperature change in scattering that modifies the amplitude of quantum oscillations. This behavior is consistent with effects attributed to spin fluctuations.

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arXiv2018

Nernst effect in the electron-doped cuprate superconductor La2-xCexCuO4

We report a systematic study of the Nernst effect in films of the electron doped cuprate superconductor La2-xCexCuO4 (LCCO) as a function of temperature and magnetic field (up to 14 T) over a range of doping from underdoped (x=0.08) to overdoped (x=0.16). We have determined the characteristic field scale HC2* of superconducting fluctuation which is found to track the dome-like dependence of superconductivity (TC). The fall of HC2* and TC with underdoping is most likely due to the onset of long range anti-ferromagnetic order. We also report the temperature onset, Tonset, of superconducting fluctuations above TC. For optimally doped x=0.11 Tonset (39 K) is high compared to TC (26 K). For higher doping Tonset decreases and tends to zero along with the critical temperature at the end of the superconducting dome. The superconducting gap closely tracks HC2* measured from the temperature and field dependent Nernst signal.

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arXiv2017

Fermi Surface reconstruction and anomalous low temperature resistivity in electron-doped La2-xCexCuO4

We report ab-plane Hall Effect and magnetoresistivity measurements on La2-xCexCuO4 thin films as a function of doping for magnetic fields up to 14T and temperatures down to 1.8K. A dramatic change in the low temperature (1.8 K) normal state Hall coefficient is found near a doping Ce=0.14. This, along with a nonlinear Hall resistance as a function of magnetic field, suggests that the Fermi surface reconstructs at a critical doping of Ce= 0.14. A competing antiferromagnetic phase is the likely cause of this Fermi surface reconstruction. Low temperature linear-in-T resistivity is found at Ce=0.14, but anomalously, also at higher doping. We compare our data with similar behavior found in hole-doped cuprates at a doping where the pseudogap ends

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