Nematic state of the FeSe superconductor

TL;DR

This study investigates the local and long-range crystal structures of FeSe, revealing that nematic order persists at short scales above 90 K and that superconducting gap anisotropy is not linked to local symmetry breaking.

Contribution

It provides detailed analysis of FeSe's local structure and nematic transition, showing the persistence of nematic order at short length scales and its independence from local symmetry breaking.

Findings

Orthorhombic distortion is more pronounced at short length scales.

Nematic order persists above 90 K at short scales.

Superconducting gap anisotropy is not linked to local symmetry breaking.

Abstract

We study the crystal structure of the tetragonal iron selenide FeSe and its nematic phase transition to the low-temperature orthorhombic structure using synchrotron x-ray and neutron scattering analyzed in both real and reciprocal space. We show that in the local structure the orthorhombic distortion associated with the electronically driven nematic order is more pronounced at short length scales. It also survives up to temperatures above 90 K where reciprocal-space analysis suggests tetragonal symmetry. Additionally, the real-space pair distribution function analysis of the synchrotron x-ray diffraction data reveals a tiny broadening of the peaks corresponding to the nearest Fe-Fe, nearest Fe-Se, and the next-nearest Fe-Se bond distances as well as the tetrahedral torsion angles at a short length scale of 20 angstr\"om. This broadening appears below 20 K and is attributed to a pseudogap. However, we did not observe any further reduction in local symmetry below orthorhombic down to 3 K. Our results suggest that the superconducting gap anisotropy in FeSe is not associated with any symmetry-lowering short-range structural correlations.