Magnetoresistance hysteresis in topological Kondo insulator SmB_6 nanowire

SmB_6, a topological Kondo insulator, with a gapped bulk state and metallic surface state has aroused great research interest. Here, we report an exotic hysteresis behavior of magnetoresistance in individual SmB_6 nanowire in a temperature range in which both surface and bulk states contribute to the total conductance. Under a magnetic field parallel to the SmB_6 nanowire, the resistance suddenly increases at the turning point from up-sweep to down-sweep of the magnetic field. The magnetoresistance hysteresis loops are well consistent with the magnetocaloric effect. Our results suggest that the SmB_6 nanowires possess potential applications in the magnetic cooling technology.     

Magnetoresistance and Kondo Effect in Nodal-Line Semimetal VAs_2

We performed calculations of the electronic band structure and the Fermi surface,measured the longitudinal resistivity ρxx(T,H),Hall resistivity ρxy(T,H),and magnetic susceptibility as a function of temperature at various magnetic fields for VAs₂ with a monoclinic crystal structure.The band structure calculations show that VAs₂ is a nodal-line semimetal when spin-orbit coupling is ignored.The emergence of a minimum at around11 K in ρxx(T) measured at H=0 demonstrates that some additional magnetic impurities(V⁴⁺,S=1/2)exist in VAs₂ single crystals,inducing Kondo scattering,evidenced by both the fitting of ρxx(T) data and the susceptibility measurements.It is found that a large positive magnetoresistance(MR) reaching 649% at 10 K and 9 T,its nearly quadratic field dependence,and a field-induced up-turn behavior of ρxx(T) also emerge in VAs₂,although MR is not so large due to the existence of additional scattering compared with other topological nontrivial/trivial semimetals.The observed properties are attributed to a perfect charge-carrier compensation,which is evidenced by both the calculations relying on the Fermi surface and the Hall resistivity measurements.These results indicate that the compounds containing V(3d³4s²) element can be as a platform for studying the influence of magnetic impurities to the topological properties.     

Observation of antiferromagnetic correlations in UBe13

The wavevector and energy dependence of the paramagnetic response in the normal phase of the Heavy Fermion system UBe₁₃ has been investigated between 10 K and 300 K using polarized neutrons and polarization analysis. At 10 K the response was found to be enhanced at non zero wave-vectors indicating the presence of strong antiferromagnetic correlations. The peaks in the scattering occured at positions expected for incipient type G antiferromagnetism of the simple cubic uranium sublattice. At room temperature the spatial correlations completely disappeared and the response was wave vector independent. Constant Q scans carried out at 10 K confirmed the Lorentzian dependence proposed by Goldman et al. [1].     

Spectroscopic evidence for unconventional superconductivity in UBe13

We report on measurements of the differential conductivity G of UBe13-Au contacts, which reveal the existence of low-energy Andreev surface bound states. These bound states are identified via huge conductance peaks at zero bias that may form only in superconductors with nontrivial energy-gap functions. From the voltage dependence of G at T6.7, much in excess of the weak coupling BCS value of 3.5, and directly indicating strong coupling effects in superconducting UBe13.     

Kondo effect in quantum dots at high voltage: universality and scaling

We examine the properties of a dc-biased quantum dot in the Coulomb blockade regime. For voltages V that are large compared to the Kondo temperature T(K), the physics is governed by the scales V and gamma, where gamma approximately V/ln(2)(V/T(K)) is the nonequilibrium decoherence rate induced by the voltage-driven current. Based on scaling arguments, self-consistent perturbation theory, and perturbative renormalization group, we argue that due to the large gamma the system can be described by renormalized perturbation theory in 1/ln(V/T(K))<1. However, in certain variants of the Kondo problem, two-channel Kondo physics is induced by a large voltage V.     

Magnetoacoustic quantum oscillations in the heavy fermion superconductor UBe13

In UBe₁₃ magnetoacoustic quantum oscillations (MAQO) are observed for the attenuation- and the sound velocity-changes in the superconducting and normal state. The observed extremal areas and the effective masses are small.     

Comment on the observation of magnetoacoustic quantum oscillations in UBe13

The origin of previously reported magnetic quantum oscillations in UBe₁₃ is possibly due to Al inclusions. New measurements of the a.c. susceptibility show Al inclusions which result from the method of crystal growth using aluminium as flux. We discuss the distribution and form of the inclusions and compare our dHvA measurements with those of the -orbits of Al.