Discovery of a strain-stabilised smectic electronic order in LiFeAs

Abstract

In many high temperature superconductors, small orthorhombic distortions of the lattice structure result in surprisingly large symmetry breaking of the electronic states and macroscopic properties, an effect often referred to as nematicity. To directly study the impact of symmetry-breaking lattice distortions on the electronic states, using low-temperature scanning tunnelling microscopy we image at the atomic scale the influence of strain-tuned lattice distortions on the correlated electronic states in the iron-based superconductor LiFeAs, a material which in its ground state is tetragonal, with four-fold ($C_4$) symmetry. Our experiments uncover a new strain-stabilised modulated phase which exhibits a smectic order in LiFeAs, an electronic state which not only breaks rotational symmetry but also reduces translational symmetry. We follow the evolution of the superconducting gap from the unstrained material with $C_4$ symmetry through the new nematic phase with two-fold ($C_2$) symmetry and charge-density-wave order to a state where superconductivity is completely suppressed.

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Cited by in corpus (27)

• Ordered and tunable Majorana-zero-mode lattice in naturally strained LiFeAs
• Discovery of a pair density wave state in a monolayer high-Tc iron-based superconductor
• Tunable vortex Majorana zero modes in LiFeAs superconductor
• Quasi 1D topological nodal vortex line phase in doped superconducting 3D Dirac Semimetals
• Incommensurate smectic phase in close proximity to the high-Tc superconductor FeSe/SrTiO3
• Visualizing nematic transition and nanoscale suppression of superconductivity in Fe(Te,Se)
• Superconductivity-induced nematicity
• Two distinct superconducting states controlled by orientation of local wrinkles in LiFeAs
• Tunable vortex Majorana modes controlled by strain in homogeneous LiFeAs
• Manipulating surface magnetic order in iron telluride
• Directly visualizing nematic superconductivity driven by the pair density wave in NbSe${}_2$
• Design and performance of an ultrahigh vacuum spectroscopic-imaging scanning tunneling microscope with a hybrid vibration isolation system
• Instability of the charge density wave in Kagome magnet FeGe
• Electronic Stripe Patterns Near the Fermi Level of Tetragonal Fe(Se,S)
• Checkerboard order state in superconducting FeSe/SrTiO3(001) monolayer
• Spectroscopic evidence of nematic fluctuations in LiFeAs
• Local Structure of Mott Insulating Iron Oxychalcogenides La${}_2$O${}_2$Fe${}_2$O$M$${}_2$ ($M$ = S, Se)
• An STM perspective on hexaborides: Surface states of the Kondo insulator SmB${}_6$
• Defect-induced electronic smectic state at the surface of nematic materials
• Stronger quantum fluctuation with larger spins: Emergent magnetism in the pressurized high-temperature superconductor FeSe
• Spin-state smectics in spin crossover materials
• Nanoscale strain manipulation of smectic susceptibility in kagome superconductors
• Absence of nematic instability in LiFeAs
• Valley polarization of Landau levels driven by residual strain in the ZrSiS surface band
• Coexistence of stripe order and superconductivity in NaAlSi
• Coexisting electronic smectic liquid crystal and superconductivity in a Si square-net semimetal
• Dual Enhancement of Superconductivity in FeSe/SrTiO3 via Orbital and Correlation Synergy