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Published January 26, 2018 | Version Submitted + Published + Supplemental Material
Journal Article Open

Evidence of an Improper Displacive Phase Transition in Cd_2Re_2O_7 via Time-Resolved Coherent Phonon Spectroscopy

Creators

  • 1. ROR icon California Institute of Technology
  • 2. ROR icon Columbia University
  • 3. ROR icon Oak Ridge National Laboratory
  • 4. ROR icon University of Tennessee at Knoxville

Abstract

We have used a combination of ultrafast coherent phonon spectroscopy, ultrafast thermometry, and time-dependent Landau theory to study the inversion symmetry breaking phase transition at T_c=200  K in the strongly spin-orbit coupled correlated metal Cd_2Re_2O_7. We establish that the structural distortion at T_c is a secondary effect through the absence of any softening of its associated phonon mode, which supports a purely electronically driven mechanism. However, the phonon lifetime exhibits an anomalously strong temperature dependence that decreases linearly to zero near T_c. We show that this behavior naturally explains the spurious appearance of phonon softening in previous Raman spectroscopy experiments and should be a prevalent feature of correlated electron systems with linearly coupled order parameters.

Additional Information

© 2018 American Physical Society. Received 3 October 2017; published 24 January 2018. This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy under Grant No. DE-SC0010533. D. H. also acknowledges funding from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation and support for instrumentation from the Institute for Quantum Information and Matter, an NSF Physics Frontiers Center (PHY-1125565) with support of the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation through Grant No. GBMF1250. J.-Q. Y. and D. G. M. were supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences, Materials Sciences and Engineering Division. Z. Y. Z. acknowledges the Center for Emergent Materials, an NSF Materials Research Science and Engineering Center under Grant No. DMR-1420451. The work of D. M. K. and A. J. M. on this project was supported by the Basic Energy Sciences Program of the U.S. Department of Energy under Grant No. SC-0012375, and D. M. K. also acknowledges DFG KE 2115/1-1.

Attached Files

Published - PhysRevLett.120.047601.pdf

Submitted - 1801.05439.pdf

Supplemental Material - AP_Harter_1-12-2018_SI.pdf

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1801.05439.pdf

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Additional details

Additional titles

Alternative title
Evidence of an Improper Displacive Phase Transition in Cd2Re2O7 via Time-Resolved Coherent Phonon Spectroscopy

Identifiers

Eprint ID
84613
Resolver ID
CaltechAUTHORS:20180131-160608890

Related works

Describes
https://arxiv.org/abs/1801.05439 (URL)

Funding

Department of Energy (DOE)
DE-SC0010533
David and Lucile Packard Foundation
Institute for Quantum Information and Matter (IQIM)
NSF
PHY-1125565
Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation
GBMF1250
NSF
DMR-1420451
Department of Energy (DOE)
DE-SC0012375
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG)
KE 2115/1-1

Dates

Created
2018-02-01
Created from EPrint's datestamp field
Updated
2021-11-15
Created from EPrint's last_modified field

Caltech Custom Metadata

Caltech groups
Institute for Quantum Information and Matter