Non-Fermi-liquid d-wave metal phase of strongly interacting electrons

Abstract

Developing a theoretical framework for conducting electronic fluids qualitatively distinct from those described by Landau's Fermi-liquid theory is of central importance to many outstanding problems in condensed matter physics. One such problem is that, above the transition temperature and near optimal doping, high-transition-temperature copper-oxide superconductors exhibit `strange metal' behaviour that is inconsistent with being a traditional Landau Fermi liquid. Indeed, a microscopic theory of a strange-metal quantum phase could shed new light on the interesting low-temperature behaviour in the pseudogap regime and on the d-wave superconductor itself. Here we present a theory for a specific example of a strange metal---the 'd-wave metal'. Using variational wavefunctions, gauge theoretic arguments, and ultimately large-scale density matrix renormalization group calculations, we show that this remarkable quantum phase is the ground state of a reasonable microscopic Hamiltonian---the usual t-J model with electron kinetic energy $t$ and two-spin exchange $J$ supplemented with a frustrated electron `ring-exchange' term, which we here examine extensively on the square lattice two-leg ladder. These findings constitute an explicit theoretical example of a genuine non-Fermi-liquid metal existing as the ground state of a realistic model.

22 pages, 12 figures: 6 pages, 7 figures of main text + 16 pages, 5 figures of Supplementary Information; this is approximately the version published in Nature, minus various subedits in the main text

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• A DMRG Study of Superconductivity in the Triangular Lattice Hubbard Model
• Cluster Luttinger liquids and emergent supersymmetric conformal critical points in the one-dimensional soft-shoulder Hubbard model
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• Transport in the non-Fermi liquid phase of isotropic Luttinger semimetals
• Spin liquid phase due to competing classical orders in the semiclassical theory of the Heisenberg model with ring exchange on an anisotropic triangular lattice
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• Spin liquid phase in the semiclassical theory of the Heisenberg model on an anisotropic triangular lattice with ring exchange
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• A DMRG study: Pair-density wave in spin-valley locked systems
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• Symmetry-protected non-Fermi liquids, Kagome spin liquids, and the chiral Kondo lattice model
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• Proximate Kitaev system for an intermediate magnetic phase in in-plane magnetic fields
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• Entanglement entropy of compressible holographic matter: loop corrections from bulk fermions
• Probing Critical Surfaces in Momentum Space Using Real-Space Entanglement Entropy: Bose versus Fermi
• Fractionalized gapless quantum vortex liquids
• Many-body quantum sign structures as non-glassy Ising models
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• Induction of non-Fermi liquids by critical cavity photons at the onset of superradiance
• Signatures of gapless fermionic spinons on a strip of the kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet
• Unconventional superfluidity in quasi-one-dimensional systems
• Anisotropic moiré band flattening in twisted bilayers of M-valley MXenes
• Flux-driven quantum spin liquids in kagome optical lattices
• Hole-doping driven antiparallel magnetic order underlying the superconducting and pseudogap states in high-temperature cuprate superconductor
• Anomalous quasiparticle lifetime in geometric quantum critical metals