Non-BCS behavior of optical properties across the cuprate phase diagram

Abstract

The finite-frequency optical properties of the underdoped cuprates, in both the normal and superconducting state, display features which go beyond a Fermi liquid and a BCS description. We provide an understanding of these properties within a simplified analytical model, which has been evolved out of the Hubbard model and ideas based on a resonating valence bond spin liquid. We find that: 1) in underdoped samples, the missing area integrals reveal a second energy scale due to the pseudogap, not present at optimum or overdoping; 2) the real part of the optical self-energy shows a large sharp peak, that emerges with the opening of the pseudogap which exists within the superconducting state and persists in the normal state; and 3) the amount of optical spectral weight which is transferred to the condensate is greatly reduced by the presence of the pseudogap as compared to the Fermi liquid case. These non-BCS features of the superconducting state are in good qualitative agreement with a body of experimental work on different cuprate systems and provide strong evidence from optical conductivity that they are all a manifestation of the pseudogap energy scale.

to appear in PRB Rapid Communications

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• A Phenomenological Theory of the Anomalous Pseudogap Phase in Underdoped Cuprates
• Anomalies in the pseudogap phase of the cuprates: Competing ground states and the role of umklapp scattering
• Kinetic-energy driven superconductivity in cuprate superconductors
• Quasiparticles in the Pseudogap Phase of Underdoped Cuprate
• Signatures of Fermi surface reconstruction in Raman spectra of underdoped cuprates
• Effect of pseudogap formation on the penetration depth of underdoped high $T_c$ cuprates
• Specific heat of underdoped cuprates: RVB versus Fermi arcs
• Signature of pseudogap formation in the density of states of underdoped cuprates
• Andreev and Single Particle Tunneling Spectroscopies in Underdoped Cuprates
• Electron pockets and pseudogap asymmetry observed in the thermopower of underdoped cuprates
• Superconductivity generated by coupling to a Cooperon in a 2-dimensional array of 4-leg Hubbard ladders
• Specific heat across the superconducting dome in the cuprates
• Effects of a particle-hole asymmetric pseudogap on Bogoliubov quasiparticles
• Signatures of a momentum independent pseudogap in the electronic density of states and Raman spectroscopy of the underdoped cuprates
• On the Origin of the Checkerboard Pattern in Scanning Tunneling Microscopy Maps of Underdoped Cuprate Superconductors
• Optical properties of the pseudogap state in underdoped cuprates
• Impurity induced resistivity upturns in underdoped cuprates
• Electron pockets and pseudogap Dirac point in underdoped cuprate superconductors
• Enhanced Josephson tunneling between high temperature superconductors through a normal pseudogap underdoped cuprate with a finite energy cooperon
• Electronic structure in underdoped cuprates due to the emergence of a pseudogap
• Isotope Effect of Underdoped Cuprates in the Yang-Rice-Zhang Model
• Fluctuation conductivity due to the preformed local pairs