Magnetic field-tuned quantum criticality in a Kondo insulator

Abstract

Kondo insulators are predicted to undergo an insulator-to-metal transition under applied magnetic field, yet the extremely high fields required to date have prohibited a comprehensive investigation of the nature of this transition. Here we show that Ce3Bi4Pd3 provides an ideal platform for this investigation, owing to the unusually small magnetic field of B ~ 11 T required to overcome its Kondo insulating gap. Above Bc, we find a magnetic field-induced Fermi liquid state whose characteristic energy scale T_FL collapses near Bc in a manner indicative of a magnetic field-tuned quantum critical point. A direct connection is established with the process of Kondo singlet formation, which yields a broad maximum in the magnetic susceptibility as a function of temperature in weak magnetic fields that evolves progressively into a sharper transition at Bc as T -> 0.

arXiv comment10 pages including 10 figures

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• Giant spontaneous Hall effect in a nonmagnetic Weyl-Kondo semimetal
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• Unraveling the 4f electronic structures of cerium monopnictides
• Controlling electronic topology in a strongly correlated electron system
• Resistivity saturation in Kondo insulators
• Isoelectronic tuning of heavy fermion systems: Proposal to synthesize Ce3Sb4Pd3
• Effects of strong correlations on the nonlinear response in Weyl-Kondo semimetals
• Localized f-electron magnetism in the semimetal Ce3Bi4Au3
• Ground state of Ce${}_3$Bi${}_4$Pd${}_3$ unraveled by hydrostatic pressure
• How to identify and characterize strongly correlated topological semimetals
• Pressure-induced concomitant topological and metal-insulator quantum phase transitions in Ce${}_3$Pd${}_3$Bi${}_4$
• Disordered 2D ferromagnetism at the surface of FeSi
• Ce${}_3$Bi${}_4$Ni${}_3$ $-$ A large hybridization-gap variant of Ce${}_3$Bi${}_4$Pt${}_3$
• CeFe${}_2$Al${}_{10}$: a Correlated Metal with a Fermi Surface Exhibiting Nonmetallic Conduction
• Excess heat capacity in magnetically ordered Ce heavy fermion metals
• Magnetism, non-Fermi-liquid behavior and deconfinement in Kondo lattices