The principal purpose of this topical review is to single out some of the universal features of high-temperature (high-Tc) and related strongly-correlated systems, which can be compared with experiment in a quantitative manner. The description starts with the concept of exchange-interaction-mediated (real-space) pairing, combined with strong correlations among narrow band electrons, for which the reference state is that of the Mott–Hubbard insulator. The physical discussion of concrete properties relies on variational approach, starting from generalized renormalized mean-field theory (RMFT) in the form of statistically-consistent Gutzwiller approximation (SGA), and its subsequent generalization, i.e., a systematic Diagrammatic Expansion of the Variational (Gutzwiller-type) Wave Function (DE-GWF). The solution leads to the two energy scales, one involving unconventional quasiparticles close to the Fermi energy, and the other reflecting the fully correlated state, involving electrons deeper below the Fermi surface. Those two regimes are separated by a kink in the dispersion relation, which is observed in photoemission. As a result, one obtains both the doping dependent properties in the correlated state, and effective renormalized quasiparticles. The reviewed ground-state characteristics for high-Tc systems encompass high-Tc superconductivity, nematicity, charge- (and pair-) density-wave effects, as well as non-BCS kinetic energy gain in the paired state. The calculated dynamic properties are: the universal Fermi velocity, the Fermi wave-vector, the effective mass enhancement, the pseudogap; and the d-wave gap magnitude. We discuss that, within the variational approach, the minimal realistic model is represented by the so-called t-J-U Hamiltonian. Inadequacy of the t-J and Hubbard models, particularly of their RMFT versions, is discussed explicitly. For heavy fermion systems, modeled by the Anderson lattice model and with the DE-GWF approach, we discuss the phase diagram, encompassing superconducting, Kondo insulating, ferro- and anti-ferromagnetic states. The superconducting state is then a two-d-wave gap system. If the orbital degeneracy of f-electrons is included, the coexistent ferromagnetic- (spin–triplet) superconducting phases appear and match those observed for UGe2 in a semiquantitative manner. Finally, in the second part, we generalize our approach to the collective spin and charge fluctuations in high-Tc systems, starting from variational approach, defining the saddle-point state, and combining it with 1/N expansion. The present scheme differs essentially from that starting from the saddle-point Hartree–Fock approximation, and incorporating the fluctuations in the random phase approximation (RPA). The spectrum of collective spin and charge excitations is determined for the Hubbard and t-J-U models, and subsequently compared quantitatively with recent experiments. The Appendices provide formal details to make this review self-contained.
The principal purpose of this topical review is to single out some of the universal features of high-temperature (high-Tc) and related strongly-correlated systems, which can be compared with experiment in a quantitative manner. The description starts with the concept of exchange-interaction-mediated (real-space) pairing, combined with strong correlations among narrow band electrons, for which the reference state is that of the Mott–Hubbard insulator. The physical discussion of concrete properties relies on variational approach, starting from generalized renormalized mean-field theory (RMFT) in the form of statistically-consistent Gutzwiller approximation (SGA), and its subsequent generalization, i.e., a systematic Diagrammatic Expansion of the Variational (Gutzwiller-type) Wave Function (DE-GWF). The solution leads to the two energy scales, one involving unconventional quasiparticles close to the Fermi energy, and the other reflecting the fully correlated state, involving electrons deeper below the Fermi surface. Those two regimes are separated by a kink in the dispersion relation, which is observed in photoemission. As a result, one obtains both the doping dependent properties in the correlated state, and effective renormalized quasiparticles. The reviewed ground-state characteristics for high-Tc systems encompass high-Tc superconductivity, nematicity, charge- (and pair-) density-wave effects, as well as non-BCS kinetic energy gain in the paired state. The calculated dynamic properties are: the universal Fermi velocity, the Fermi wave-vector, the effective mass enhancement, the pseudogap; and the d-wave gap magnitude. We discuss that, within the variational approach, the minimal realistic model is represented by the so-called t-J-U Hamiltonian. Inadequacy of the t-J and Hubbard models, particularly of their RMFT versions, is discussed explicitly. For heavy fermion systems, modeled by the Anderson lattice model and with the DE-GWF approach, we discuss the phase diagram, encompassing superconducting, Kondo insulating, ferro- and anti-ferromagnetic states. The superconducting state is then a two-d-wave gap system. If the orbital degeneracy of f-electrons is included, the coexistent ferromagnetic- (spin–triplet) superconducting phases appear and match those observed for UGe2 in a semiquantitative manner. Finally, in the second part, we generalize our approach to the collective spin and charge fluctuations in high-Tc systems, starting from variational approach, defining the saddle-point state, and combining it with 1/N expansion. The present scheme differs essentially from that starting from the saddle-point Hartree–Fock approximation, and incorporating the fluctuations in the random phase approximation (RPA). The spectrum of collective spin and charge excitations is determined for the Hubbard and t-J-U models, and subsequently compared quantitatively with recent experiments. The Appendices provide formal details to make this review self-contained.
We study the effect of the correlated hopping term and the intersite Coulomb interaction term on principal features of the d-wave superconducting (SC) state, in both the electron- and hole-doped regimes within the $t\text{\ensuremath{-}}J\text{\ensuremath{-}}U$ model. In our analysis, we use the approach based on the diagrammatic expansion of the Gutzwiller wave function (DE-GWF), which allows us to go beyond the renormalized mean-field theory (RMFT). We show that the correlated hopping term enhances the pairing at the electron-doped side of the phase diagram. Moreover, the so-called non-BCS regime (which manifests itself by the negative kinetic energy gain at the transition to the SC phase) is narrowed down with the increasing magnitude of the correlated hopping $\ensuremath{\sim}K$. Also, the doping dependencies of the nodal Fermi velocity and Fermi momentum, as well as the average number of double occupancies, are analyzed with reference to the experimental data for selected values of the parameter K. For the sake of completeness, the influence of the intersite Coulomb repulsion on the obtained results is provided. Additionally, selected results concerning the Hubbard-model case are also presented. A complete model with all two-site interactions is briefly discussed in Appendix for reference.
High-temperature superconductivity in copper oxides (cuprates, e.g. La2−xSrxCuO4, YBa2Cu3O6+δ or Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+δ) remains among the most spectacular phenomena in condensed matter physics. Since its discovery in 1986, an enormous number (∼ 105) of papers on the subject have appeared. So far, there is no single, commonly accepted theory of high-temperature superconductivity. However, it is widely believed that a basic description of this phenomenon can be provided by a single-band Hubbard model or its derivative, the t-J model. The latter model is regarded as a minimal microscopic model, capable of describing the essential aspects of the complex physics of the cuprates. Unfortunately, in general case, neither of those two models can be solved exactly and therefore various approximate methods are used. Among them, the so-called mean-field methods provide a simple, yet fairly reasonable description of the cuprates. In particular, some of the main qualitative features of the phase diagram and the essential features of electronic spectrum are roughly reproduced. A standard mean-field approach to the t-J model, known under the name of renormalized mean-field theory (RMFT) goes beyond the Hartree-Fock approximation. Consequently, its fully consistent treatment requires a novel theoretical approach. This has been our original motivation to develop a general approach to the mean-field models, which is based on the maximum entropy (MaxEnt) principle. The method is presented in detail in Part II of this Thesis, and in Part III it is applied to study RMFT of the t-J model. First, we compare the results obtained within our formalism with those of the frequently used non-variational approach based entirely on the self-consistent equations. Also, various versions of RMFT are compared, and the most satisfactory of them is selected. This optimal version is subsequently used to study different versions of the original t-J Hamiltonian. As a result, upper critical concentration and doping dependence of the selected physical quantities (e.g. the superconducting gap and the Fermi velocity) is determined at low temperatures and in the absence of external magnetic field. We compare our findings both with theoretical results obtained from the Variational Monte Carlo (VMC) methods, as well as with the experimental data for selected cuprates. We show that the version of RMFT approach formulated in this Thesis provides a reasonable qualitative and in some cases semiquantitative rationalization of the principal characteristics of the hole-doped high-temperature superconductors at the optimal doping and in the overdoped regime. Possible extensions of the proposed analysis are mentioned at the end.
A systematic diagrammatic expansion for Gutzwiller-wave functions (DE-GWF) is formulated and used for the description of superconducting (SC) ground state in the two-dimensional Hubbard model with electron-transfer amplitudes t (and ${t}^{\ensuremath{'}}$) between nearest (and next-nearest) neighbors. The method is numerically very efficient and allows for a detailed analysis of the phase diagram as a function of all relevant parameters (U, $\ensuremath{\delta}$, ${t}^{\ensuremath{'}}$) and a determination of the kinetic-energy driven pairing region. SC states appear only for substantial interactions, $U/t\ensuremath{\gtrsim}3$, and for not too large hole doping, $\ensuremath{\delta}\ensuremath{\lesssim}0.32$ for ${t}^{\ensuremath{'}}=0.25t$; this upper critical doping value agrees well with experiment for the cuprate high-temperature superconductors. We also obtain other important features of the SC state: (i) the SC gap at the Fermi surface resembles ${d}_{{x}^{2}\ensuremath{-}{y}^{2}}$-wave only around the optimal doping and the corrections to this state are shown to arise from the longer range of the pairing; (ii) the nodal Fermi velocity is almost constant as a function of doping and agrees quantitatively with the experimental results; (iii) the SC transition is driven by the kinetic-energy lowering for low doping and strong interactions.
A systematic diagrammatic expansion for Gutzwiller wavefunctions (DE-GWFs) proposed very recently is used for the description of the superconducting (SC) ground state in the two-dimensional square-lattice t – J model with the hopping electron amplitudes t (and ) between nearest (and next-nearest) neighbors. For the example of the SC state analysis we provide a detailed comparison of the methodʼs results with those of other approaches. Namely, (i) the truncated DE-GWF method reproduces the variational Monte Carlo (VMC) results and (ii) in the lowest (zeroth) order of the expansion the method can reproduce the analytical results of the standard Gutzwiller approximation (GA), as well as of the recently proposed 'grand-canonical Gutzwiller approximation' (called either GCGA or SGA). We obtain important features of the SC state. First, the SC gap at the Fermi surface resembles a wave only for optimally and overdoped systems, being diminished in the antinodal regions for the underdoped case in a qualitative agreement with experiment. Corrections to the gap structure are shown to arise from the longer range of the real-space pairing. Second, the nodal Fermi velocity is almost constant as a function of doping and agrees semi-quantitatively with experimental results. Third, we compare the doping dependence of the gap magnitude with experimental data. Fourth, we analyze the k -space properties of the model: Fermi surface topology and effective dispersion. The DE-GWF method opens up new perspectives for studying strongly correlated systems, as it (i) works in the thermodynamic limit, (ii) is comparable in accuracy to VMC, and (iii) has numerical complexity comparable to that of the GA (i.e., it provides the results much faster than the VMC approach).
A nonzero-temperature technique for strongly correlated electron lattice systems, combining elements of both variational wave function (VWF) approach and expansion in the inverse number of fermionic flavors (1/Nf), is developed. The departure point, VWF method, goes beyond the renormalized mean-field theory and provides semiquantitative description of principal equilibrium properties of high-Tc superconducting cuprates. The developed here scheme of VWF+1/Nf, in the leading order provides dynamical spin and charge responses around the VWF solution, generalizing the weak-coupling spin-fluctuation theory to the regime of strong correlations. Thermodynamic corrections to the correlated saddle-point state arise systematically at consecutive orders. Explicitly, VWF+1/Nf is applied to evaluate dynamical response functions for the hole-doped Hubbard model and compared with available determinant quantum Monte Carlo data, yielding a good overall agreement in the regime of coherent collective-mode dynamics. The emergence of well-defined spin and charge excitations from the incoherent continua is explicitly demonstrated and a nonmonotonic dependence of the charge-excitation energy on the interaction magnitude is found. The charge mode energy saturates slowly when approaching the strong-coupling limit, which calls for a reevaluation of the $t\text{\ensuremath{-}}J$-model approach to the charge dynamics in favor of more general $t\text{\ensuremath{-}}J\text{\ensuremath{-}}U$ and $t\text{\ensuremath{-}}J\text{\ensuremath{-}}U\text{\ensuremath{-}}V$ models. The results are also related to recent inelastic resonant x-ray and neutron-scattering experiments for the high-Tc cuprates.
High temperature superconductivity in copper oxides (cuprates) represents one of the most striking phenomena in condensed matter physics. These materials host superconducting states with the highest known critical temperatures, emerging upon doping antiferromagnetic insulator compounds. The antiferromagnetic (AF) insulating and superconducting (SC) phases defy standard descriptions in terms of band picture and conventional phonon-mediated superconductivity. In fact, these phenomena are genuine signatures of strong electronic correlations which hinder effective single-particle descriptions of the many-electron system. After 40 years since their discovery, it is widely accepted that the Hubbard model on the square lattice provides a minimal description of the low-energy electronic properties of cuprates. The model describes the competition between the electronic kinetic energy, modelled by nearest-neighbours hopping t, and the Coulomb repulsion, modelled by a purely local interaction potential U. At half-filling, this competition results in the so-called "Mott localisation" phenomenon, which distinguishes the metallic phase for U/t « 1 from an insulating phase for U/t » 1. The latter is characterised by the almost complete localisation of electrons due to the high energetic cost of hopping towards occupied sites. Interestingly, this basic competition is intimately related to AF ordering and, upon doping, to the formation of the SC state with characteristic d-wave symmetry. The fact that a purely repulsive interaction U is responsible for the formation of a SC state is remarkable, being superconductivity typically associated with an effective attractive interaction. In fact, a d-wave SC state can also be obtained, in general, by considering an attractive potential between electrons of neighbouring sites. Motivated by this observation, in this thesis, we study a modified version of the Hubbard model, dubbed as the "extended Hubbard model", in which we include a nearest-neighbours attractive potential -V. The general goal of this work is to explore the interplay between the purely local repulsion and the non-local attraction. This is not only motivated by the fact that both interactions are, in principle, responsible for d-wave superconductivity, but also by recent experimental observations which strongly suggest that the term -V needs to be included in order to accurately describe the magnetic spectra of some specific compounds. In this thesis, we study the extended Hubbard model using the Hartree-Fock method. Namely, we approximate the ground state by implementing a variational search in the subspace of the many-body Hilbert space of gaussian states. Despite its simplicity, the Hartree-Fock method provides a powerful framework to study competition among different phases, originating from different symmetry breaking mechanisms. In particular, we study the competition between three different phases: the normal phase, characterised by no symmetry breaking, the AF phase, characterised by a lowering of SU(2) symmetry, and the SC phase, characterised by the breaking of U(1) charge conservation. This thesis work led to a number of original results, which can be summarised by the general observation that the non-local attraction -V acts cooperatively with the local repulsion U for the stabilisation of the various phases hosted by the Hubbard model. For the normal phase, we find that the non-local attraction acts as a source of Mott localisation, leading to an effective reduction of the electronic bandwidth. In particular, for values of V larger than a critical value and close to half-filling, we find a strong Mott localisation characterised by the complete flattening of the electronic bands. Interestingly, this result shows an example of Mott localisation that can be described at the level of the Hartree-Fock approximation, whereas Mott localisation in the conventional Hubbard model usually requires more sophisticated approximation schemes. For the AF phase, we restrict our analysis to the half-filled case. We find that the pairing-induced Mott localisation leads to a significant enhancement of the magnetisation, primarily originating from the local repulsion U. Finally, we focus on the superconducting phase and derive self-consistency equations in both singlet and triplet Cooper pairing channels, showing how Cooper pairing can be mediated simultaneously by both the local repulsion and the non-local attraction. Therefore, we numerically investigate the singlet channel and find evidence of "symmetry mixing", namely, the formation of a superconducting gap that is neither symmetric nor anti-symmetric under rotations of π/2 in the plane. We show that symmetry mixing is connected to the emergence of a finite nematic order parameter, that signals the breaking of planar rotational symmetry. This nematic symmetry breaking results in the fact that the renormalisation of bands becomes anisotropic, producing a difference in electronic kinetics in the x and y directions. To summarise, the original results obtained in this thesis show that the non-local pairing provides a different route towards the formation of key strongly correlated phenomena, including Mott localisation and nematic superconductivity, and call for future investigation using more sophisticated methods such as, for example, the Dynamical Mean Field Theory.