We employed the contact forces induced by a near-field tip to tune and probe the optical resonances of a mechanically compliant photonic crystal molecule. Here, the pressure induced by the near-field tip is exploited to control the spectral proprieties of the coupled cavities in an ultrawide spectral range, demonstrating a reversible mode shift of $37.5\mathrm{nm}$. Besides, by monitoring the coupling strength variation due to the vertical nanodeformation of the dielectric structure, distinct tip-sample interaction regimes have been unambiguously reconstructed with a nano-Newton sensitivity. These results demonstrate an optical method for mapping mechanical forces at the nanoscale with a lateral spatial resolution below 100 nm.

We theoretically investigate nonlinear ballistic thermoelectric transport in a superlattice-structured nanowire. By a special choice of nonuniform widths of the superlattice barriers—analogous to antireflection coating in optical systems—it is possible to achieve a transmission which comes close to a square profile as a function of energy. We calculate the low-temperature output power and power-conversion efficiency of a thermoelectric generator based on such a structure and show that the efficiency remains high also when operating at a significant power. To provide guidelines for experiments, we study how the results depend on the nanowire radius, the number of barriers, and on random imperfections in barrier width and separation. Our results indicate that high efficiencies can indeed be achieved with today's capabilities in epitaxial nanowire growth.

We compare the thermal conductance $G_{\mathrm{thermal}}$ (at temperature $T)$ and the electrical shot-noise power $P_{\mathrm{shot}}$ (at bias voltage $V\gg k_{\mathrm{B}}T/e)$ of Majorana fermions on the two-dimensional surface of a three-dimensional topological superconductor. We present analytical and numerical calculations to demonstrate that, for a local coupling between the superconductor and metal contacts, $G_{\mathrm{thermal}}/P_{\mathrm{shot}}=\mathcal{L}T/eV$ (with $\mathcal{L}$ the Lorenz number). This relation is ensured by the combination of electron-hole and time-reversal symmetries, irrespective of the microscopics of the surface Hamiltonian, and provides for a purely electrical way to detect the charge-neutral Majorana surface states. A surface of aspect ratio $W/L\gg 1$ has the universal shot-noise power $P_{\mathrm{shot}}=(W/L)\times (e^2/h)\times (eV/2\pi )$.

We study the properties of the avoided or hidden quantum critical point (AQCP) in three-dimensional Dirac and Weyl semimetals in the presence of short range potential disorder. By computing the averaged density of states (along with its second and fourth derivative at zero energy) with the kernel polynomial method (KPM) we systematically tune the effective length scale that eventually rounds out the transition and leads to an AQCP. We show how to determine the strength of the avoidance, establishing that it is not controlled by the long wavelength component of the disorder. Instead, the amount of avoidance can be adjusted via the tails of the probability distribution of the local random potentials. A binary distribution with no tails produces much less avoidance than a Gaussian distribution. We introduce a double Gaussian distribution to interpolate between these two limits. As a result we are able to make the length scale of the avoidance sufficiently large so that we can accurately study the properties of the underlying transition (that is eventually rounded out), unambiguously identify its location, and provide accurate estimates of the critical exponents $\nu =1.01\pm 0.06$ and $z=1.50\pm 0.04$. We also show that the KPM expansion order introduces an effective length scale that can also round out the transition in the scaling regime near the AQCP.

We have performed angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy on HfSiS, which has been predicted to be a topological line-node semimetal with square Si lattice. We found a quasi-two-dimensional Fermi surface hosting bulk nodal lines, alongside the surface states at the Brillouin-zone corner exhibiting a sizable Rashba splitting and band-mass renormalization due to many-body interactions. Most notably, we discovered an unexpected Dirac-like dispersion extending one dimensionally in $k$ space—the Dirac-node arc—near the bulk node at the zone diagonal. These novel Dirac states reside on the surface and could be related to hybridizations of bulk states, but currently we have no explanation for its origin. This discovery poses an intriguing challenge to the theoretical understanding of topological line-node semimetals.

We examine the efficiency of an effective two-terminal thermoelectric device under broken time-reversal symmetry. The setup is derived from a three-terminal thermoelectric device comprising a thermal terminal and two electronic contacts, under a magnetic field. We find that breaking time-reversal symmetry in the presence of the inelastic electron-phonon processes can significantly enhance the figure of merit for delivering electric power by supplying heat from a phonon bath, beyond the one for producing the electric power by investing thermal power from the electronic heat current. The efficiency of such a device is bounded by the non-negativity of the entropy production of the original three-terminal junction. The efficiency at maximal power can be quite close to the Carnot efficiency, but then the electric power vanishes.

In the context of a recoil damping analysis, we have designed and produced a membrane resonator equipped with a specific on-chip structure working as a “loss shield” for a circular membrane. In this device the vibrations of the membrane, with a quality factor of ${10}^7$, reach the limit set by the intrinsic dissipation in silicon nitride, for all the modes and regardless of the modal shape, also at low frequency. Guided by our theoretical model of the loss shield, we describe the design rationale of the device, which can be used as effective replacement of commercial membrane resonators in advanced optomechanical setups, also at cryogenic temperatures.

The electronic structure of selected rare-earth atoms adsorbed on a free-standing graphene was investigated using methods beyond the conventional density functional theory (DFT+$U$, DFT+HIA, and DFT+ED). The influence of the electron correlations and the spin-orbit coupling on the magnetic properties has been examined. The DFT+$U$ method predicts both atoms to carry local magnetic moments (spin and orbital) contrary to a nonmagnetic $f^6$ $\left(J=0\right)$ ground-state configuration of Sm in the gas phase. Application of $\mathrm{DFT}$+Hubbard-I (HIA) and $\mathrm{DFT}$+exact diagonalization (ED) methods cures this problem, and yields a nonmagnetic ground state with six $f$ electrons and $J=0$ for the Sm adatom. Our calculations show that Nd adatom remains magnetic, with four localized $f$ electrons and $J=4.0$. These conclusions could be verified by STM and XAS experiments.

Single-layer steps at Si(100) surfaces/interfaces present significant challenges to the quantitative characterization of buried dopant devices as well as the accurate imaging and relocation of fabricated quantum structures. We demonstrate the detailed spatially resolved scanning tunneling spectroscopy study across monolayer step edges on Si(100) surfaces and quantitative determination of the local density of state distributions and behavior of the band gap at step edges. The influence on the local electrostatic environment due to step edge states has been quantified while accounting for the effects of scanning tunneling measurement conditions. The dangling bond states on Si(100) surfaces are utilized as a fingerprint to quantify the local band bending landscape and to make corrections to the experimentally observed surface state energy levels and band gap values at the step edge regions. We observe a significant band gap narrowing behavior along a rebonded single-layer type B step edge on a degenerately boron-doped $p$-type Si substrate.

We study numerically the effect of the edge states on the conductance and thermopower in zigzag phosphorene nanoribbons (ZPNRs) based on the tight-binding model and the scattering-matrix method. It is interesting to find that the band dispersion, conductance, and thermopower can be modulated by applying a bias voltage and boundary potentials to the two layers of the ZPNRs. Under a certain bias voltage, the twofold-degenerate quasi-flat-edge bands split perfectly. The conductance can be switched off, and the thermopower around zero energy increases. In addition, when only the boundary potential of the top layer or bottom layer is adjusted, only one edge band bends and merges into the bulk band. The first conductance plateau is strongly decreased to $e^2/h$ around zero energy. In particular, when the two boundary potentials are adjusted, all the edge bands bend and fully merge into the bulk band, and the bulk energy gap is maximized. More interestingly, a pronounced conductance plateau with $G=0$ is found around zero energy, which is attributable to the opening of the bulk energy gap between the valence and conduction bands. Meanwhile, the thermopower can be enhanced more than twice compared to that of the perfect ZPNRs. The large magnitude of thermopower is ascribed to the appearance of the bulk energy gap around zero energy. Our results show that the modulated ZPNRs are more reliable in a thermoelectric application.

First-order phase transitions, classical or quantum, subject to randomness coupled to energylike variables (bond randomness) can be rounded, resulting in continuous transitions (emergent criticality). We study perhaps the simplest such model, the quantum three-color Ashkin-Teller model, and show that the quantum critical point in $(1+1)$ dimension is an unusual one, with activated scaling at the critical point and Griffiths-McCoy phase away from it. The behavior is similar to the transverse random field Ising model, even though the pure system has a first-order transition in this case. We believe that this fact must be attended to when discussing quantum critical points in numerous physical systems.

We report critical current density ($J_c$) in tetragonal FeS single crystals, similar to iron-based superconductors with much higher superconducting critical temperatures ($T_c$). The $J_c$ is enhanced three times by 6% Se doping. We observe scaling of the normalized vortex pinning force as a function of reduced field at all temperatures. Vortex pinning in FeS and ${\mathrm{FeS}}_{0.94}{\mathrm{Se}}_{0.06}$ shows contribution of core-normal surfacelike pinning. Reduced temperature dependence of $J_c$ indicates that dominant interaction of vortex cores and pinning centers is via scattering of charge carriers with reduced mean free path ($\delta l$), in contrast to ${\mathrm{K}}_x{\mathrm{Fe}}_{2-y}{\mathrm{Se}}_2$ where spatial variations in $T_c$ ($\delta T_c$) prevails.

$\mathrm{R}{\mathrm{h}}_2\mathrm{M}{\mathrm{o}}_3\mathrm{N}$, with a noncentrosymmetric $\beta$-manganese structure, has been found to be superconducting with critical temperature $T_c\approx 4.3\mathrm{K}$. Magnetic field dependence of resistivity, magnetization, and specific heat measurements show that its upper critical field of ${\mu }_0{H}_{c2}^{*}\sim 7.41\mathrm{T}$ comes close to, but does not exceed, the Pauli paramagnetic limit and that the $2\mathrm{\Delta }/k_{\mathrm{B}}{T}_c$ value of about 3.62 is in accordance with a conventional $s$-wave superconductor. Andreev reflection spectroscopy measurements using both normal metal and half-metal show conclusively $s$-wave pairing with an isotropic gap.

We study a recently proposed quantum dimer model for the pseudogap metal state of the cuprates. The model contains bosonic dimers, representing a spin-singlet valence bond between a pair of electrons, and fermionic dimers, representing a quasiparticle with spin-1/2 and charge $+e$. By density matrix renormalization group calculations on a long but finite cylinder, we obtain the ground-state density distribution of the fermionic dimers for a number of different total densities. From the Friedel oscillations at open boundaries, we deduce that the Fermi surface consists of small hole pockets near $(\pi /2,\pi /2)$, and this feature persists up to a doping density of 1/16. We also compute the entanglement entropy and find that it closely matches the sum of the entanglement entropies of a critical boson and a low density of free fermions. Our results support the existence of a fractionalized Fermi liquid in this model.

For continuous Mott metal-insulator transitions in layered two-dimensional systems, we demonstrate the phenomenon of dimensional decoupling: the system behaves as a three-dimensional metal in the Fermi-liquid side but as a stack of decoupled two-dimensional layers in the Mott insulator. We show that the dimensional decoupling happens at the Mott quantum critical point itself. We derive the temperature dependence of the interlayer electric conductivity in various crossover regimes near such a continuous Mott transition, and discuss experimental implications.

The Mori's projection method, known as the memory function method, is an important theoretical formalism to study various transport coefficients. In the present work, we calculate the dynamical thermal conductivity in the case of metals using the memory function formalism. We introduce thermal memory functions for the first time and discuss the behavior of thermal conductivity in both the zero frequency limit and in the case of nonzero frequencies. We compare our results for the zero frequency case with the results obtained by the Bloch-Boltzmann kinetic approach and find that both approaches agree with each other. Motivated by some recent experimental advancements, we obtain several new results for the ac or the dynamical thermal conductivity.

We construct exactly solved commuting projector Hamiltonian lattice models for all known (2+1)-dimensional (2+1D) fermionic symmetry protected topological phases (SPTs) with on-site unitary symmetry group $G_f=G\times {\mathbb{Z}}_2^f$, where $G$ is finite and ${\mathbb{Z}}_2^f$ is the fermion parity symmetry. In particular, our models transcend the class of group supercohomology models, which realize some, but not all, fermionic SPTs in 2+1D. A natural ingredient in our construction is a discrete form of the spin structure of the 2D spatial surface $M$ on which our model is defined, namely a “Kasteleyn” orientation of a certain graph associated with the lattice. As a special case, our construction yields commuting projector models for all eight members of the ${\mathbb{Z}}_8$ classification of 2D fermionic SPTs with $G={\mathbb{Z}}_2$.