Persistent spin excitations in doped antiferromagnets revealed by resonant inelastic light scattering

C. J. Jia, E. A. Nowadnick, K. Wohlfeld, Y. F. Kung, C. C. Chen, S. Johnston, T. Tohyama, B. Moritz, T. P. Devereaux

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

122 Scopus citations

Abstract

How coherent quasiparticles emerge by doping quantum antiferromagnets is a key question in correlated electron systems, whose resolution is needed to elucidate the phase diagram of copper oxides. Recent resonant inelastic X-ray scattering (RIXS) experiments in hole-doped cuprates have purported to measure high-energy collective spin excitations that persist well into the overdoped regime and bear a striking resemblance to those found in the parent compound, challenging the perception that spin excitations should weaken with doping and have a diminishing effect on superconductivity. Here we show that RIXS at the Cu L3-edge indeed provides access to the spin dynamical structure factor once one considers the full influence of light polarization. Further we demonstrate that high-energy spin excitations do not correlate with the doping dependence of Tc, while low-energy excitations depend sensitively on doping and show ferromagnetic correlations. This suggests that high-energy spin excitations are marginal to pairing in cuprate superconductors.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Article number3314
JournalNature communications
Volume5
DOIs
StatePublished - Feb 28 2014
Externally publishedYes

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • General Chemistry
  • General Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology
  • General Physics and Astronomy

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Persistent spin excitations in doped antiferromagnets revealed by resonant inelastic light scattering'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this