We report magnetic susceptibility, electrical conductivity and optical absorption of ${\mathrm{Ce}}_{1-x}{M}_x{\mathrm{O}}_2$ where $M$ = Nb,Ta and $0\le x\le 0.03$. The dc conductivity follows a simple thermally activated Arrhenius-type behavior in the $T=70$–700 K range with a change in slope at $T^{*}\approx 155$ K. The high-temperature activation energy shows gradual increase from $\approx 170$ to 220 meV as the dopant concentration increases. The activation energy of the low-temperature conductivity shows a broad minimum of $\approx 77$ meV at $x\approx 0.01$. Electron transport and localization mechanisms are analyzed in the framework of the Holstein small polaron, Anderson localization, and Jahn-Teller distortion models. The fit to the small polaron mobility is dramatically improved when, instead of the longitudinal phonons, the transverse optical phonons are considered in the phonon-assisted electron transport. This serves as an indirect evidence of a strong $4f^1$ orbital interaction with the oxygen ligands, similar to the case of ${\mathrm{PrO}}_2$. Based on comparison of the experimental data to the models, it is proposed that the defect-induced random electric fields make the dominant contribution to the electron localization in donor-doped ceria.

The magnetic-field dependence of the energy spectrum, wave function, binding energy, and oscillator strength of exciton states confined in a circular graphene quantum dot (CGQD) is obtained within the configuration interaction method. We predict that (i) excitonic effects are very significant in the CGQD as a consequence of a combination of geometric confinement, magnetic confinement, and reduced screening; (ii) two types of excitons (intravalley and intervalley) are present in the CGQD because of the valley degree of freedom in graphene; (iii) the intravalley and intervalley exciton states display different magnetic-field dependencies due to the different electron-hole symmetries of the single-particle energy spectra; (iv) with increasing magnetic field, the exciton ground state in the CGQD undergoes an intravalley to intervalley transition accompanied by a change of angular momentum; (v) the exciton binding energy does not increase monotonically with the magnetic field due to the competition between geometric and magnetic confinements; and (vi) the optical transitions of the intervalley and intravalley excitons can be tuned by the magnetic field, and valley-dependent excitonic transitions can be realized in a CGQD.

The impact of flexoelectric coupling on polarization reversal and space-charge variation in thin films of ferroelectric semiconductors has been studied theoretically. The relaxation-type Landau-Khalatnikov equation together with the Poisson equation and the theory of elasticity equations have been used to calculate in a self-consistent way the spatial-temporal development of ferroelectric polarization, electric potential, space charge, elastic stresses and strains. The analysis of the obtained results reveals a moderate increase in the flexocoupling influence on the polarization, elastic strain, electric potential, and space-charge development with a decrease in the ferroelectric film thickness. In contrast, the dependence of polarization switching time on the applied electric field is remarkably affected by the flexocoupling strength. The polarization reversal process consists typically of two stages; the first stage has no characteristic time, whereas the second one exhibits a switching time strongly dependent on the applied electric field.

Local aspects of magnetism of disordered FePt are investigated by ab initio fully relativistic full-potential calculations, employing the supercell approach and the coherent potential approximation (CPA). The focus is on trends of the spin and orbital magnetic moments with chemical composition and with bond lengths around the Fe and Pt atoms. A small but distinct difference between average magnetic moments obtained when using the supercells and when relying on the CPA is identified and linked to the neglect of the Madelung potential in the CPA.

We present a theory of optical conductivity in systems with finite-momentum Cooper pairs. In contrast to the BCS pairing where ac conductivity is purely imaginary in the clean limit, there is nonzero ac absorption across the superconducting gap for finite-momentum pairing if we break the Galilean symmetry explicitly in the electronic Hamiltonian. Vertex correction is crucial for maintaining the gauge invariance in the mean-field formalism and dramatically changes the optical conductivity in the direction of the pairing momentum. We carried out a self-consistent calculation and gave an explicit formula for optical conductivity in a simple case. This result applies to the Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov state and candidates with pair density waves proposed for high-$T_{\text{c}}$ cuprates. It may help detect pair density waves and determine the pairing gap as well as the direction of the pairing momentum in experiments.

Extreme magnetoresistance (XMR) in topological semimetals is a recent discovery which attracts attention due to its robust appearance in a growing number of materials. To search for a relation between XMR and superconductivity, we study the effect of pressure on LaBi. By increasing pressure, we observe the disappearance of XMR followed by the appearance of superconductivity at $P\approx 3.5$ GPa. We find a region of coexistence between superconductivity and XMR in LaBi in contrast to other superconducting XMR materials. The suppression of XMR is correlated with increasing zero-field resistance instead of decreasing in-field resistance. At higher pressures, $P\approx 11$ GPa, we find a structural transition from the face-centered cubic lattice to a primitive tetragonal lattice, in agreement with theoretical predictions. The relationship between extreme magnetoresistance, superconductivity, and structural transition in LaBi is discussed.

We investigated surface acoustic wave propagation in a Ni/${\mathrm{LiNbO}}_3$ hybrid device. We found that the absorption and phase velocity are dependent on the sign of the wave vector, which indicates that the surface acoustic wave propagation has nonreciprocal characteristics induced by simultaneous breaking of time-reversal and spatial inversion symmetries. The nonreciprocity was reversed by ${180}^{\circ }$ rotation of the magnetic field. The origin of the nonreciprocity is ascribed to interference of shear-type and longitudinal-type magnetoelastic couplings.

Two quaternary Heusler alloys, equiatomic CuNiMnAl and CuNiMnSn, are studied using density functional theory to understand their tendency for atomic disorder on the lattice and the magnetic effects of disorder. Disordered structures with antisite defects of atoms of the same and different sublattices are considered, with the level of atomic disorder ranging from 3% to 25%. Formation energies and magnetic moments are calculated relative to the ordered ground state and combined with a simple thermodynamical model to estimate temperature effects. We predict the relative levels of disordering in the two equiatomic alloys with good correlation to experimental x-ray diffraction results. The effect of swaps involving Mn is also discussed.

We theoretically study the response of a many-body localized system to a local quench from a quantum information perspective. We find that the local quench triggers entanglement growth throughout the whole system, giving rise to a logarithmic lightcone. This saturates the modified Lieb-Robinson bound for quantum information propagation in many-body localized systems previously conjectured based on the existence of local integrals of motion. In addition, near the localization-delocalization transition, we find that the final states after the local quench exhibit volume-law entanglement. We also show that the local quench induces a deterministic orthogonality catastrophe for highly excited eigenstates, where the typical wave-function overlap between the pre- and postquench eigenstates decays exponentially with the system size.

Three-dimensional (3D) Dirac semimetals that can be seen as 3D analogues of graphene have attracted enormous interest in research recently. In order to apply these ultra-high-mobility materials in future electronic/optoelectronic devices, it is crucial to understand the relaxation dynamics of photoexcited carriers and their coupling with lattice. In this paper, we report ultrafast transient reflection measurements of the photoexcited carrier dynamics in cadmium arsenide ($\mathrm{C}{\mathrm{d}}_3\mathrm{A}{\mathrm{s}}_2$), which is one of the most stable Dirac semimetals that have been confirmed experimentally. By using the low-energy probe photon of 0.3 eV, we probed the dynamics of the photoexcited carriers that are Dirac-Fermi-like approaching the Dirac point. We systematically studied the transient reflection on bulk and nanoplate samples that have different doping intensities by tuning the probe wavelength, pump power, and lattice temperature and find that the dynamical evolution of carrier distributions can be retrieved qualitatively by using a two-temperature model. This result is very similar to that of graphene, but the carrier cooling through the optical phonon couplings is slower and lasts over larger electron temperature range because the optical phonon energies in $\mathrm{C}{\mathrm{d}}_3\mathrm{A}{\mathrm{s}}_2$ are much lower than those in graphene.

We report that in cylindrical nanorods with chiral interactions spin textures corresponding to spatial skyrmion oscillations can be stabilized depending on the initial state, as revealed by micromagnetic calculations. The skyrmion oscillation, or skyrmion-chain state, occurs when the diameter of the rod is larger than the helical pitch length of the material, and the number of skyrmions on the chain is proportional to the length of the nanorod. The topological charge is localized, breaking translational symmetry, but in the presence of a uniaxial anisotropy, or upon the application of an external field, the localization disappears and a single skyrmion line is formed. These findings provide a deeper understanding of the interplay between geometry and topology, and show how spatial confinement specifically in curved solids can stabilize skyrmionic spin textures.

Superconductivity in two-dimensional compounds is widely studied, not only because of its application in constructing nano-superconducting devices, but also for general scientific interest. Very recently, borophene (a two-dimensional boron sheet) has been successfully grown on the Ag(111) surface, through direct evaporation of a pure boron source. The experiment unveiled two types of borophene structures, namely ${\beta }_{12}$ and ${\chi }_3$. Herein, we employed density-functional first-principles calculations to investigate the electron-phonon coupling and superconductivity in both structures of borophene. The band structures of ${\beta }_{12}$ and ${\chi }_3$ borophenes exhibit inherent metallicity. We found that electron-phonon coupling constants in the two compounds are larger than that in ${\mathrm{MgB}}_2$. The superconducting transition temperatures were determined to be 18.7 K and 24.7 K through the McMillian-Allen-Dynes formula. These temperatures are much higher than the theoretically predicted 8.1 K and experimentally observed 7.4 K superconductivity in graphene. Our findings will enrich nano-superconducting device applications and boron-related materials science.

We present a quasiparticle interference study of clean and Mn surface-doped TaAs, a prototypical Weyl semimetal, to test the screening properties as well as the stability of Fermi arcs against Coulomb and magnetic scattering. Contrary to topological insulators, the impurities are effectively screened in Weyl semimetals. The adatoms significantly enhance the strength of the signal such that theoretical predictions on the potential impact of Fermi arcs can be unambiguously scrutinized. Our analysis reveals the existence of three extremely short, previously unknown scattering vectors. Comparison with theory traces them back to scattering events between large parallel segments of spin-split trivial states, strongly limiting their coherence. In sharp contrast to previous work [R. Batabyal et al., Sci. Adv. 2, e1600709 (2016)], where similar but weaker subtle modulations were interpreted as evidence of quasiparticle interference originating from Femi arcs, we can safely exclude this being the case. Overall, our results indicate that intra- as well as inter-Fermi arc scattering are strongly suppressed and may explain why—in spite of their complex multiband structure—transport measurements show signatures of topological states in Weyl monopnictides.

We examine the efficacy of dark-mode plasmonics as a platform for enhanced magneto-optics. The dark mode of a small particle consists of two co-existing equal-intensity and mutually opposing dipolar excitations. Each of these two opposing dipoles may even resonate at or near the dark-mode frequency, but the net dipole moment vanishes due to the mutual cancellation between the opposing dipoles. We show that application of external magnetic bias may alleviate the intense destructive interference. Furthermore, under external magnetic bias the opposing dark resonances of a plasmonic particle shift in opposite directions and create a region of extremely sensitive Faraday rotation. We show that the magnetized dark resonance in a lossless Ag-like particle may provide more than 20 degrees rotation under magnetic fields of the order of 1–2 Tesla, exhibiting magnetoplasmonic activity that is 2–3 orders of magnitude larger than that observed in a conventional plasmonic particle of the same material.

Anderson insulators are noninteracting disordered systems which have localized single-particle eigenstates. The interacting analog of Anderson insulators are the many-body localized (MBL) phases. The spectrum of the many-body eigenstates of an Anderson insulator is efficiently represented as a set of product states over the single-particle modes. We show that product states over matrix product operators of small bond dimension is the corresponding efficient description of the spectrum of an MBL insulator. In this language all of the many-body eigenstates are encoded by matrix product states (i.e., density matrix renormalization group wave functions) consisting of only two sets of low bond dimension matrices per site: the $G_i$ matrices corresponding to the local ground state on site $i$ and the $E_i$ matrices corresponding to the local excited state. All $2^n$ eigenstates can be generated from all possible combinations of these sets of matrices.

The ${\left(\mathrm{BN}\right)}_{1-x}{\left({\mathrm{C}}_2\right)}_x$ alloys are promising materials for band-gap engineering in two-dimensional electronics. In this work, we provide a complete scenario of statistical possibilities for the distribution of atoms and its influence on electronic and optical properties. Using first-principles calculations combined with the generalized quasichemical approximation to account for disorder effects, we study the properties of these two-dimensional alloys as a function of their average composition. Our results show that atomic arrangements with C-C and B-N bonds are energetically favored over the ones with B-B and N-N bonds, explaining the known tendency to phase separation, verified by a $T-x$ phase diagram. We calculate the energy gap as a function of the composition considering both composition fluctuation and phase separation effects. Experimental data are discussed in this context. Finally, we obtain absorption spectra reproducing a two-peak pattern for intermediate carbon concentrations found experimentally and identified with phase-segregated instead of homogeneous alloys.

Asymmetry in a three-electron double quantum dot (DQD) allows spin blockade, when spin-3/2 (quadruplet) states and spin-1/2 (doublet) states have different charge configurations. We have observed this DQD spin blockade near the (1,2)-(2,1) charge transition using a pulsed-gate technique and a charge sensor. We, then, use this spin blockade to detect Landau-Zener-Stückelberg interference and coherent oscillations between the spin quadruplet and doublet states. Such studies add to our understandings of coherence and control properties of three-spin states in a double dot, which, in turn, would benefit explorations into various qubit encoding schemes in semiconductor nanostructures.

We present a theoretical investigation for the full counting statistics of the Andreev tunneling through a quantum dot (QD) embedded between superconducting (SC) and normal leads in the presence of a strong on-site electron-phonon interaction using nonequilibrium Green function method. For this purpose, we generalize the dressed tunneling approximation (DTA) recently developed in dealing with inelastic tunneling in a normal QD system to the Andreev transport issue. This method takes account of vibrational effect in evaluation of electronic tunneling self energy in comparison with other simple approaches and meanwhile allows us to derive an explicit analytical formula for the cumulant generating function at the subgap region. We then analyze the interplay of polaronic and SC proximity effects on the Andreev reflection spectrum, current-voltage characteristics, and current fluctuations of the hybrid system. Our main findings include: (1) no phonon side peaks in the linear Andreev conductance; (2) a negative differential conductance stemming from the suppressed Andreev reflection spectrum; (3) a novel inelastic resonant peak in the differential conductance due to phonon assisted Andreev reflection; (4) enhancement or suppression of shot noise for the symmetric or asymmetric tunnel-coupling system, respectively.