Time-resolved photoluminescence is employed to examine a transition from localized to extended electron states below the Fermi level in multiple narrow quantum well GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructures, where disorder was generated by interface roughness. Such a transition resembles the metal-insulator transition profoundly investigated by electric transport measurements. An important distinction distinguishes the localized-to-extended-states transition studied here: it takes place below the Fermi level in an electron system with a constant concentration, which implies unchanging Coulomb correlations. Moreover, for such a localized-to-extended-states transition the temperature is shown to be irrelevant. In the insulating regime the magnetic field was found to cause an additional momentum relaxation which considerably enhanced the recombination rate. Thus, we propose a method to explore the evolution of the localized electron states in a system with a fixed disorder and Coulomb interaction.

The nonstoichiometric double perovskite oxide $\mathrm{L}{\mathrm{a}}_2\mathrm{N}{\mathrm{i}}_{1.19}\mathrm{O}{\mathrm{s}}_{0.81}{\mathrm{O}}_6$ was synthesized by solid-state reaction and its crystal and magnetic structures were investigated by powder x-ray and neutron diffraction. $\mathrm{L}{\mathrm{a}}_2\mathrm{N}{\mathrm{i}}_{1.19}\mathrm{O}{\mathrm{s}}_{0.81}{\mathrm{O}}_6$ crystallizes in the monoclinic double perovskite structure (general formula $A_{2}B{B}^{\prime }{\mathrm{O}}_6$) with space group $P{2}_1/n$, where the $B$ site is fully occupied by Ni and the $B$′ site by 19% Ni and 81% Os atoms. Using x-ray absorption spectroscopy an $\mathrm{O}{\mathrm{s}}^{4.5+}$ oxidation state was established, suggesting the presence of about 50% paramagnetic $\mathrm{O}{\mathrm{s}}^{5+}$ ($5d^3, S=3/2$) and 50% nonmagnetic $\mathrm{O}{\mathrm{s}}^{4+}$ ($5d^4, J_{\mathrm{eff}}=0$) ions at the $B$′ sites. Magnetization and neutron diffraction measurements on $\mathrm{L}{\mathrm{a}}_2\mathrm{N}{\mathrm{i}}_{1.19}\mathrm{O}{\mathrm{s}}_{0.81}{\mathrm{O}}_6$ provide evidence for a ferrimagnetic transition at 125 K. The analysis of the neutron data suggests a canted ferrimagnetic spin structure with collinear $\mathrm{N}{\mathrm{i}}^{2+}$-spin chains extending along the $c$ axis but a noncollinear spin alignment within the $ab$ plane. The magnetization curve of $\mathrm{L}{\mathrm{a}}_2\mathrm{N}{\mathrm{i}}_{1.19}\mathrm{O}{\mathrm{s}}_{0.81}{\mathrm{O}}_6$ features a hysteresis with a very high coercive field, $H_{\mathrm{C}}=41\mathrm{kOe}$, at $T=5\mathrm{K}$, which is explained in terms of large magnetocrystalline anisotropy due to the presence of Os ions together with atomic disorder. Our results are encouraging to search for rare-earth-free hard magnets in the class of double perovskite oxides.

A theoretical formalism is developed to simultaneously solve equation of motion of the magnetizations in two ferromagnets and the spin-pumping induced spin transport equation. Based on the formalism, a coupled motion of the magnetizations in a self-oscillation state is studied. The spin pumping is found to induce an in-phase synchronization of the magnetizations for the oscillation around the easy axis. For an out-of-plane self-oscillation around the hard axis, on the other hand, the spin pumping leads to an in-phase synchronization in a small current region, whereas an antiphase synchronization is excited in a large current region. An analytical theory based on the phase equation reveals that the phase difference between the magnetizations in a steady state depends on the oscillation direction, clockwise or counterclockwise, of the magnetizations.

Thermodynamic properties of the twisted three-leg spin tube under magnetic field are studied by the finite-$T$ density-matrix renormalization group method. The specific heat, spin, and chiral susceptibilities of the infinite system are calculated for both the original and its low-energy effective models. The obtained results show that the presence of the chirality is observed as a clear peak in the specific heat at low temperature and the contribution of the chirality dominates the low-temperature part of the specific heat as the exchange coupling along the spin tube decreases. The peak structures in the specific heat, spin, and chiral susceptibilities are strongly modified near the quantum phase transition where the critical behaviors of the spin and chirality correlations change. These results confirm that the chirality plays a major role in characteristic low-energy behaviors of the frustrated spin systems.

This work demonstrates that the magnetization and angular momentum compensation temperatures ($T_{\mathrm{MC}}$ and $T_{\mathrm{AMC}}$) in ferrimagnets can be unambiguously determined by performing two sets of temperature-dependent current switching, with the symmetry reversals at $T_{\mathrm{MC}}$ and $T_{\mathrm{AMC}}$, respectively. A theoretical model based on the modified Landau-Lifshitz-Bloch equation is developed to systematically study the spin torque effect under different temperatures, and numerical simulations are performed to corroborate our proposal. Furthermore, we demonstrate that the recently reported linear relation between $T_{\mathrm{AMC}}$ and $T_{\mathrm{MC}}$ can be explained using the Curie-Weiss theory.

Through density functional theory simulations with the generalized gradient approximation, confirmed by the more sophisticated hybrid functional, we predict the triggering of $d^0$ ferromagnetism in C doped ${\mathrm{Y}}_2{\mathrm{O}}_3$ at a hole density of $3.36\times {10}^{21}\mathrm{c}{\mathrm{m}}^{-3}$ (one order less than the critical hole density of ZnO) having magnetic moment of $2.0{\mu }_B$ per defect with ferromagnetic coupling large enough to promote room-temperature ferromagnetism. The persistence of ferromagnetism at room temperature is established through computation of the Curie temperature by the mean field approximation and ab initio molecular dynamics simulations. The induced magnetic moment is mainly contributed by the $2p$ orbital of the impurity C and the $2p$ orbital of O and we quantitatively and extensively demonstrate through the analysis of density of states and ferromagnetic coupling that the Stoner criterion is satisfied to activate room-temperature ferromagnetism. As the system is stable at room temperature, C doped ${\mathrm{Y}}_2{\mathrm{O}}_3$ has feasible defect formation energy and ferromagnetism survives for the choice of hybrid exchange functional, and at room temperature we strongly believe that C doped ${\mathrm{Y}}_2{\mathrm{O}}_3$ can be tailored as a room-temperature diluted magnetic semiconductor for spintronic applications.

Topological semimetals are characterized by their intriguing Fermi surfaces (FSs) such as Weyl and Dirac points, or nodal FS, and their associated surface states. Among them, topological crystalline semimetals, in the presence of strong spin-orbit coupling, possess a nodal FS protected by nonsymmorphic lattice symmetries. In particular, it was theoretically proposed that ${\mathrm{SrIrO}}_3$ exhibits a bulk nodal ring due to glide symmetries, as well as flat two-dimensional surface states related to chiral and mirror symmetries. However, due to the semimetallic nature of the bulk, direct observation of these surface states is difficult. Here we study the effect of flat-surface states on phonon modes for ${\mathrm{SrIrO}}_3$ side surfaces. We show that mirror odd optical surface phonon modes are damped at the zone center, as a result of coupling to the surface states with different mirror parities, while even modes are unaffected. This observation could be used to infer their existence, and experimental techniques for such measurements are also discussed.

We propose a class of lasers based on a fourth-order exceptional point of degeneracy (EPD) referred to as the degenerate band edge (DBE). EPDs have been found in parity-time-symmetric photonic structures that require loss and/or gain; here we show that the DBE is a different kind of EPD since it occurs in periodic structures that are lossless and gainless. Because of this property, a small level of gain is sufficient to induce single-frequency lasing based on a synchronous operation of four degenerate Floquet-Bloch eigenwaves. This lasing scheme constitutes a light-matter interaction mechanism that leads also to a unique scaling law of the laser threshold with the inverse of the fifth power of the laser-cavity length. The DBE laser has the lowest lasing threshold in comparison to a regular band edge laser and to a conventional laser in cavities with the same loaded quality $\left(Q\right)$ factor and length. In particular, even without mirror reflectors the DBE laser exhibits a lasing threshold which is an order of magnitude lower than that of a uniform cavity laser of the same length and with very high mirror reflectivity. Importantly, this novel DBE lasing regime enforces mode selectivity and coherent single-frequency operation even for pumping rates well beyond the lasing threshold, in contrast to the multifrequency nature of conventional uniform cavity lasers.

The unique transport properties of B20 FeSi have been investigated for decades. The progress in theoretical calculations allows the explanation and prediction of more and more of such properties. In this paper we investigate the lattice thermal conductivity of FeSi. Calculation for pristine FeSi severely overestimates the lattice thermal conductivity compared to experiment. We point out that the defect concentration can be considerably larger than indicated by the Hall coefficient. The defect formation energies are calculated and it is found that a substantial amount of iron vacancies can form at thermal equilibrium. These will lead to an increased phonon scattering. To explain the thermal conductivity of FeSi, we consider phonon-phonon, isotope, and phonon-defect scattering to assess possible scattering mechanisms. The calculated thermal conductivities indicate that phonon-defect scattering is important in order to explain the reported experimental values.

The influence of a perpendicular magnetic field on the binding energy and structural properties of excitons, trions, and biexcitons in monolayers of semiconducting transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) is investigated. The stochastic variational method (SVM) with a correlated Gaussian basis is used to calculate the different properties of these few-particle systems. In addition, we present a simplified variational approach which supports the SVM results for excitons as a function of magnetic field. The exciton diamagnetic shift is compared with recent experimental results, and we extend this concept to trions and biexcitons. The effect of a local potential fluctuation, which we model by a circular potential well, on the binding energy of trions and biexcitons is investigated and found to significantly increase the binding of those excitonic complexes.

The effect of spin-orbit coupling on the electron-phonon interaction in a (4/3)-monolayer of Pb on Si(111) is investigated within the density-functional theory and linear-response approach in the mixed-basis pseudopotential representation. We show that the spin-orbit interaction produces a large weakening of the electron-phonon coupling strength, which appears to be strongly overestimated in the scalar relativistic calculations. The effect of spin-orbit interaction is largely determined by the induced modification of Pb electronic bands and a stiffening of the low-energy part of phonon spectrum, which favor a weakening of the electron-phonon coupling strength. The state-dependent strength of the electron-phonon interaction in occupied Pb electronic bands varies depending on binding energy rather than electronic momentum. It is markedly larger than the value averaged over electron momentum because substrate electronic bands make a small contribution to the phonon-mediated scattering and agrees well with the experimental data.

By using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES), the variation of the electronic structure of ${\mathrm{HfSe}}_2$ has been studied as a function of sodium intercalation. We observe how this drives a band splitting of the $p$-orbital valence bands and a simultaneous reduction of the indirect band gap by values of up to 400 and 280 meV, respectively. Our calculations indicate that such behavior is driven by the band deformation potential, which is a result of our observed strain induced by sodium intercalation. The applied uniaxial strain calculations based on density functional theory agree strongly with the experimental ARPES data. These findings should assist in studying the physical relationship between intercalation and strain, as well as for large-scale two-dimensional straintronics.

Many-body localization has become an important phenomenon for illuminating a potential rift between nonequilibrium quantum systems and statistical mechanics. However, the nature of the transition between ergodic and localized phases in models displaying many-body localization is not yet well understood. Assuming that this is a continuous transition, analytic results show that the length scale should diverge with a critical exponent $\nu \ge 2$ in one-dimensional systems. Interestingly, this is in stark contrast with all exact numerical studies which find $\nu \sim 1$. We introduce the Schmidt gap, new in this context, which scales near the transition with an exponent $\nu >2$ compatible with the analytical bound. We attribute this to an insensitivity to certain finite-size fluctuations, which remain significant in other quantities at the sizes accessible to exact numerical methods. Additionally, we find that a physical manifestation of the diverging length scale is apparent in the entanglement length computed using the logarithmic negativity between disjoint blocks.

Atomic chains configured in a helical geometry have fascinating properties, including phases hosting localized bound states in their electronic structure. We show how the zero-dimensional state—bound to the edge of a single one-dimensional helical chain of tellurium atoms—evolves into two-dimensional bands on the $c$-axis surface of the three-dimensional trigonal bulk. We give an effective Hamiltonian description of its dispersion in $k$ space by exploiting confinement to a virtual bilayer, and elaborate on the diminished role of spin-orbit coupling. These intrinsic gap-penetrating surface bands were neglected in the interpretation of seminal experiments, where two-dimensional transport was otherwise attributed to extrinsic accumulation layers.

The phonon-induced renormalization of electronic band structures is investigated through first-principles calculations based on the density functional perturbation theory for nine materials with various crystal symmetries. Our results demonstrate that the magnitude of the zero-point renormalization (ZPR) of the electronic band structure is dependent on both crystal structure and material composition. We have performed analysis of the electron-phonon-coupling–induced renormalization for two silicon (Si) allotropes, three carbon (C) allotropes, and four boron nitride (BN) polymorphs. Phonon dispersions of each material were computed, and our analysis indicates that materials with optical phonons at higher maximum frequencies, such as graphite and hexagonal BN, have larger absolute ZPRs, with the exception of graphene, which has a considerably smaller ZPR despite having phonon frequencies in the same range as graphite. Depending on the structure and material, renormalizations can be comparable to the GW many-body corrections to Kohn-Sham eigenenergies and, thus, need to be considered in electronic structure calculations. The temperature dependence of the renormalizations is also considered, and in all materials, the eigenenergy renormalization at the band gap and around the Fermi level increases with increasing temperature.

We report the detailed study on transport properties of ${\mathrm{ZrB}}_2$ single crystal, a predicted topological nodal-line semimetal. ${\mathrm{ZrB}}_2$ exhibits extremely large magnetoresistance as well as field-induced resistivity upturn and plateau. These behaviors can be well understood by the two-band model with the perfect electron-hole compensation and high carrier mobilities. More importantly, the electrons with small effective masses and nontrivial Berry phase have significantly high density when compared to those in known topological semimetals. It strongly suggests that ${\mathrm{ZrB}}_2$ hosts Dirac-like nodal-line fermions.

By using the gauge-invariant optical Bloch equation, we perform a microscopic kinetic investigation on the anomalous Hall effect in chiral $p$-wave superconducting states. Specifically, the intrinsic anomalous Hall conductivity in the absence of the magnetic field is zero as a consequence of Galilean invariance in our description. As for the extrinsic channel, a finite anomalous Hall current is obtained from the impurity scattering with the optically excited normal quasiparticle current even at zero temperature. From our kinetic description, it can be clearly seen that the excited normal quasiparticle current is due to an induced center-of-mass momentum of Cooper pairs through the acceleration driven by ac electric field. For the induced anomalous Hall current, we show that the conventional skew-scattering channel in the linear response makes the dominant contribution in the strong impurity interaction. In this case, our kinetic description as a supplementary viewpoint mostly confirms the results of Kubo formalism in the literature. Nevertheless, in the weak impurity interaction, this skew-scattering channel becomes marginal and we reveal that an induction channel from the Born contribution dominates the anomalous Hall current. This channel, which has long been overlooked in the literature, is due to the particle-hole asymmetry by nonlinear optical excitation. Finally, we study the case in the chiral $p$-wave superconducting state with a transverse conical magnetization, which breaks the Galilean invariance. In this situation, the intrinsic anomalous Hall conductivity is no longer zero. Comparison of this intrinsic channel with the extrinsic one from impurity scattering is addressed.

We investigate the effects of local vibrational excitations in the nonsymmetrized current noise $S\left(\omega \right)$ of a nanojunction. For this purpose, we analyze a simple model—the Holstein model—in which the junction is described by a single electronic level that is coupled to two metallic leads and to a single vibrational mode. Using the Keldysh Green's function technique, we calculate the nonsymmetrized current noise to the leading order in the charge-vibration interaction. For the noise associated to the latter, we identify distinct terms corresponding to the mean-field noise and the vertex correction. The mean-field result can be further divided into an elastic correction to the noise and in an inelastic correction, the second one being related to energy exchange with the vibration. To illustrate the general behavior of the noise induced by the charge-vibration interaction, we consider two limit cases. In the first case, we assume a strong coupling of the dot to the leads with an energy-independent transmission, whereas in the second case we assume a weak tunneling coupling between the dot and the leads such that the transport occurs through a sharp resonant level. We find that the noise associated to the vibration-charge interaction shows a complex pattern as a function of the frequency $\omega$ and of the transmission function or of the dot's energy level. Several transitions from enhancement to suppression of the noise occurs in different regions, which are determined, in particular, by the vibrational frequency. Remarkably, in the regime of an energy-independent transmission, the zero-order elastic noise vanishes at perfect transmission and at positive frequency, whereas the noise related to the charge-vibration interaction remains finite, enabling the analysis of the pure vibrational-induced current noise.

Flouroarsenide CaFeAsF is a parent compound of the 1111 type of iron-based superconductors. It is similar to the parent LaFeAsO, but it is oxygen-free. To date, studies of pressure-induced effects have only focused on pure and doped polycrystalline CaFeAsF samples. Here, we carried out high-pressure electrical resistivity and Hall coefficient measurements up to 48.2 GPa on single crystals of CaFeAsF. The structural transition temperature $T_{\mathrm{str}}$ decreased monotonically upon increasing the pressure, and reached $\sim 60\mathrm{K}$ at 9.6 GPa. Superconductivity emerged suddenly at 8.6 GPa with the $T_{c,\mathrm{onset}}\sim 25.7\mathrm{K}$, which decreased monotonically with increasing pressure to 5.7 K under 48.2 GPa. Moreover, just after the appearance of superconductivity, the Hall coefficient at 40 K started to decrease with increasing pressure, while keeping its sign negative persisting up to 48.2 GPa.