We propose a possible realization of the overscreened Kondo impurity problem by a magnetic
s=1/2 impurity embedded in a two-dimensional
S=1 U(1) spin liquid with a Fermi surface. This problem contains an interesting interplay between non-Fermi-liquid behavior induced by a
U(1) gauge field coupled to fermions and a non-Fermi-liquid fixed point in the overscreened Kondo problem. Using a large-
N expansion together with an expansion in the dynamical exponent of the gauge field, we find that the coupling to the gauge field leads to weak but observable changes in the physical properties of the system at the overscreened Kondo fixed point. We discuss the extrapolation of this result to a physical case and argue that the realization of overscreened Kondo physics could lead to observations of effects due to gauge fields.
The Kondo problem, which describes the interaction of a spin
s magnetic impurity with a free Fermi gas, is a classic example of strongly coupled physics. Historically, the problem has been solved by Wilson's numerical renormalization group and later by Bethe ansatz. In this paper, we present an alternate analytic solution of the Kondo problem that combines an expansion in
1/s with the renormalization group. We study both the case of an impurity interacting with a single channel
K=1 of fermions in the
s→∞ limit and the case with
K channels in the double-scaling limit
K→∞,
s→∞,
K/s fixed. Our approach allows us to describe analytically intermediate scales of the Kondo problem at large
s and compute thermodynamic observables such as the impurity entropy and susceptibility. We find these observables to agree with the Bethe ansatz results. We also compute the impurity spectral function, finite temperature resistivity and the Kondo screening cloud profile, properties that are not easily accessible from Bethe ansatz. Notably, in the regime
K>2s we access the "non-Fermi-liquid" overscreened fixed point of the multichannel Kondo problem.
Whereas in the familiar Kondo effect the exchange interaction is dipolar, there are systems in which the exchange interaction is multipolar, as has been realized in a recent experiment. Here, we study multipolar Kondo effect in a Fermi gas of cold
173Yb atoms. Making use of different ac polarizabilities of the electronic ground state
Yb(1S0) and the long-lived metastable state
Yb∗(3P2), it is suggested that the latter atoms can be localized and serve as a dilute concentration of magnetic impurities while the former ones remain itinerant. The exchange mechanism between the itinerant Yb and the localized
Yb∗ atoms is analyzed and shown to be antiferromagnetic. The quadrupole and octupole interactions act to enhance the Kondo temperature
TK that is found to be experimentally accessible. The bare exchange Hamiltonian needs to be decomposed into dipole
(d), quadrupole
(q), and octupole
(o) interactions in order to retain its form under renormalization group (RG) analysis, in which the corresponding exchange constants $({\ensuremath{\lambda}}_{\text{d}},{\ensuremath{\lambda}}_{\text{q}}$, and ${\ensuremath{\lambda}}_{\text{o}})$ flow independently. Numerical solution of the RG scaling equations reveals a few finite fixed points. Arguments are presented that the Fermi-liquid fixed point at low temperature is unstable, indicating that the impurity is overscreened, which suggests a non-Fermi-liquid phase. The impurity contributions to the specific heat, entropy, and the magnetic susceptibility are calculated in the weak coupling regime $(T\ensuremath{\gg}{T}_{K})$, and are compared with the analogous results obtained for the standard case of dipolar exchange interaction (the $s\ensuremath{-}d$ Hamiltonian).
The traditional multichannel Kondo effect takes place when several gapless metallic electronic channels interact with a localized spin-
S impurity, with the number of channels
n exceeding the size of the impurity spin,
n>2S, leading to the emergence of non-Fermi liquid impurity behavior at low temperatures. Here, we show that the effect can be realized even when the electronic degrees of freedom are strongly correlated and gapped. The system under consideration consists of a single spin-
21 impurity coupled isotropically to
n spin singlet superconducting channels realized by one-dimensional leads with quasi-long-range superconducting order. The competition between the Kondo and superconducting fluctuations induces multiple distinct ground states and boundary phases depending on the relative strengths of the bulk and boundary interactions. Using the Bethe Ansatz technique, we identify four regimes: an overscreened Kondo phase, a zero-mode phase, a Yu-Shiba-Rusinov (YSR) phase, and a local-moment phase with an unscreened impurity, each with its own experimental characteristic. We describe the renormalization-group flow, the excitation spectrum, and the full impurity thermodynamics in each phase. Remarkably, even in the presence of a bulk mass gap, the boundary critical behavior in the Kondo phase is governed by the same exponents as in the gapless theory with the low-energy impurity sector flowing to the
SU(2)n Wess-Zumino-Witten (WZW) fixed point, and the impurity entropy monotonically decreasing as a function of temperature. In both the overscreened Kondo and zero-mode phases, the residual impurity entropy is
Simp(T→0)=ln[2cos(π/(n+2))]. In the YSR and unscreened phases on the other hand the impurity entropy exhibits non-monotonic temperature dependence and is effectively free at low temperatures with
Simp(T→0)=ln2.
We study how the non-Fermi-liquid nature of the overscreened multichannel Kondo impurity model affects the response to a BCS pairing term that, in the absence of the impurity, opens a gap $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}$. We find that the low-energy spectrum in the limit $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}0$ actually does not correspond to the spectrum strictly at $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}=0$. In particular, in the two-channel Kondo model, the $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}0$ ground state is an orbitally degenerate spin singlet, while it is an orbital singlet with a residual spin degeneracy at $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}=0$. In addition, there are fractionalized spin-1/2 subgap excitations whose energy in units of $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}$ tends toward a finite and universal value when $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}\ensuremath{\rightarrow}0$, as if the universality of the anomalous power-law exponents that characterize the overscreened Kondo effect turned into universal energy ratios when the scale invariance is broken by $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}\ensuremath{\ne}0$. This intriguing phenomenon can be explained by the renormalization flow toward the overscreened fixed point and the gap cutting off the orthogonality catastrophe singularities. We also find other non-Fermi-liquid features at finite $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Delta}}$: the local density of states lacks coherence peaks, the states in the continuum above the gap are unconventional, and the boundary entropy is a nonmonotonic function of temperature. The persistent subgap excitations are characteristic of the non-Fermi-liquid fixed point of the model, and thus depend on the impurity spin and the number of screening channels.
The phase diagram of the multichannel Kondo Hamiltonian with an
XXZ spin-exchange anisotropy is revisited, revealing a far richer fixed-point structure than previously appreciated. For a spin-
21 impurity and
k>2 conduction-electron channels, a second ferromagneticlike domain is found deep inside the antiferromagnetic regime. The new domain extends above a (typically large) critical longitudinal coupling
Jz∗>0 and is separated from the antiferromagnetic domain by a second Kosterlitz-Thouless line. A similar line of stable ferromagneticlike fixed points with a residual isospin-
21 local moment is shown to exist for large ${J}_{z}⪢\ensuremath{\mid}{J}_{\ensuremath{\perp}}\ensuremath{\mid}>0$ and arbitrary
k and
s obeying $\ensuremath{\mid}k\ensuremath{-}2s\ensuremath{\mid}>1$. Here,
Jz is the longitudinal spin-exchange coupling, ${J}_{\ensuremath{\perp}}$ is the transverse coupling, and
s is the impurity spin. Near the free-impurity fixed point, spin-exchange anisotropy generates a highly relevant term for
s>1∕2 and arbitrary
k. Depending on the sign of ${J}_{z}^{2}\ensuremath{-}{J}_{\ensuremath{\perp}}^{2}$ and the parity of
2s, the system flows either to a conventional Fermi liquid with no residual degeneracy or to a
k-channel, spin-
21 Kondo effect or to a line of ferromagneticlike fixed points with a residual isospin-
21 local moment. These results are obtained through a combination of perturbative renormalization-group techniques, Abelian bosonization, a strong-coupling expansion in
1∕Jz, and explicit numerical renormalization-group calculations.