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Intact quasiparticles at an unconventional quantum critical point

M. L. Sutherland, E. C. T. O'Farrell, W. H. Toews, J. Dunn, K. Kuga, S. Nakatsuji, Y. Machida, K. Izawa, and R. W. Hill
Phys. Rev. B 92, 041114(R) – Published 20 July 2015
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Abstract

We report measurements of in-plane electrical and thermal transport properties in the limit T0 near the unconventional quantum critical point in the heavy-fermion metal βYbAlB4. The high Kondo temperature TK200 K in this material allows us to probe transport extremely close to the critical point, at unusually small values of T/TK<5×104. Here we find that the Wiedemann-Franz law is obeyed at the lowest temperatures, implying that the Landau quasiparticles remain intact in the critical region. At finite temperatures we observe a non-Fermi-liquid T-linear dependence of inelastic-scattering processes to energies lower than those previously accessed. These processes have a weaker temperature dependence than in comparable heavy fermion quantum critical systems, revealing a temperature scale of T0.3K which signals a sudden change in the character of the inelastic scattering.

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  • Received 31 July 2014
  • Revised 22 May 2015

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.92.041114

©2015 American Physical Society

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Rescuing the Quasiparticle

Published 20 July 2015

Experiments with heavy-fermion materials show that quasiparticles exist at the critical point of a quantum phase transition.

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Authors & Affiliations

M. L. Sutherland1,*, E. C. T. O'Farrell2, W. H. Toews3, J. Dunn3, K. Kuga2, S. Nakatsuji2, Y. Machida4, K. Izawa4, and R. W. Hill3

  • 1Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge, JJ Thomson Avenue, Cambridge CB3 0HE, United Kingdom
  • 2Institute for Solid State Physics, University of Tokyo, Kashiwa 277-8581, Japan
  • 3GWPI and Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, N2L 3G1
  • 4Department of Physics, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Meguro 152-8551, Japan

  • *Corresponding author: mls41@cam.ac.uk

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Issue

Vol. 92, Iss. 4 — 15 July 2015

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