Dynamical slowing down in an ultrafast photo-induced phase transition

Abstract

Complex systems, which consist of a large number of interacting constituents, often exhibit universal behavior near a phase transition. A slowdown of certain dynamical observables is one such recurring feature found in a vast array of contexts. This phenomenon, known as critical slowing down, is well studied mostly in thermodynamic phase transitions. However, it is less understood in highly nonequilibrium settings, where the time it takes to traverse the phase boundary becomes comparable to the timescale of dynamical fluctuations. Using transient optical spectroscopy and femtosecond electron diffraction, we studied a photo-induced transition of a model charge-density-wave (CDW) compound, LaTe${}_3$. We observed that it takes the longest time to suppress the order parameter at the threshold photoexcitation density, where the CDW transiently vanishes. This finding can be quantitatively captured by generalizing the time-dependent Landau theory to a system far from equilibrium. The experimental observation and theoretical understanding of dynamical slowing down may offer insight into other general principles behind nonequilibrium phase transitions in many-body systems.

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Cited by in corpus (10)

• Light-Induced Charge Density Wave in LaTe${}_3$
• Light-Driven Raman Coherence as a Non-Thermal Route to Ultrafast Topology Switching
• Self-similar dynamics of order parameter fluctuations in pump-probe experiments
• Formation of buried domain walls in the ultrafast transition of SmTe${}_3$
• Amplitude dynamics of charge density wave in LaTe${}_3$: theoretical description of pump-probe experiments
• Evidence for realignment of the charge density wave state in ErTe${}_3$ and TmTe${}_3$ under uniaxial stress via elastocaloric and elastoresistivity measurements
• Bypassing the structural bottleneck in the ultrafast melting of electronic order
• Dynamical decoding of the competition between charge density waves in a kagome superconductor
• Photocurrent-driven transient symmetry breaking in the Weyl semimetal TaAs
• Detection of squeezed phonons in pump-probe spectroscopy