Glass-induced enhancement of superconducting $T_c$: Pairing via dissipative mediators

Abstract

With substantial evidence of glassy behavior in the phase diagram of high $T_c$ superconductors and its co-existence with superconductivity, we attempt to answer the question: what are the properties of a superconducting state where the force driving cooper pairing becomes dissipative? We find that when the bosonic mediator is local, dissipation acts to reduce the superconducting critical temperature ($T_c$). On the other hand, contrary to naïve expectations, $T_c$ behaves non-monotonically with dissipation for a non-local mediator -- weakly dissipative bosons at different energy scales act coherently to give rise to an increase in $T_c$ and eventually destroy superconductivity when the dissipation exceeds a critical value. The critical value occurs when dissipative effects become comparable to the energy scale associated with the spatial stiffness of the mediator, at which point, $T_c$ acquires a maximum. We outline consequences of our results to recent proton irradiation experiments (M. Leroux et al.,~\cite{Welp2018}) on the cuprate superconductor La${}_{2-x}$Ba${}_x$CuO${}_4$ (LBCO) which observe a disorder induced increase in $T_c$ even when the transition temperature of the proximate charge density wave (CDW) is unaffected by the presence of irradiation. Our mechanism is a novel way to raise $T_c$ that does not require a `tug-of-war' -type scenario between two competing phases.

3 figures, 6 pages

References in corpus (7)

• Eigenfunction fractality and pseudogap state near superconductor-insulator transition
• Enhancement of $T_c$ by disorder in underdoped iron pnictides
• Similar glassy features in the NMR response of pure and disordered La1.88Sr0.12CuO4
• Properties of charge density waves in La${}_{2-x}$Ba${}_x$CuO${}_4$
• Evidence of a critical hole concentration in underdoped YBa${}_2$Cu${}_3$O${}_y$ single crystals revealed by ${}^{63}$Cu NMR
• s-wave Superconductivity Phase Diagram in the Inhomogeneous Two-Dimensional Attractive Hubbard Model
• Effect of disorder on the competition between nematic and superconducting order in FeSe

Cited by in corpus (7)

• Anharmonic theory of superconductivity in the high-pressure materials
• Possible enhancement of the superconducting $T_c$ due to sharp Kohn-like soft phonon anomalies
• Superconducting dome in ferroelectric-type materials from soft mode instability
• Anharmonic theory of superconductivity and its applications to emerging quantum materials
• Superconductivity from Luttinger surfaces: Emergent $\infty$-body SYK physics
• Black Rubber and the Non-linear Elastic Response of Scale Invariant Solids
• Glassy heat capacity from overdamped phasons and a hypothetical phason-induced superconductivity in incommensurate structures