Coulombian disorder in Charge Density Waves

TL;DR

This paper investigates how unscreened charged impurities affect charge density wave systems, showing that long-range Coulomb disorder mimics thermal fluctuations in smectic-A phases, with potential experimental implications.

Contribution

It provides a theoretical calculation of x-ray intensity in charged impurity-doped charge density waves, revealing a unique disorder signature similar to thermal fluctuations.

Findings

X-ray intensity matches that of thermal fluctuations in smectic-A.

Long-range Coulomb disorder dominates static correlations.

Potential observation in doped blue bronze materials.

Abstract

When unscreened charged impurities are introduced in charge density wave system the long wavelength component of the disorder is long ranged and dominates static correlation functions. We calculate the x-ray intensity and find that it is identical to the one produced by thermal fluctuations in a disorder-free smectic-A. We suggest that this effect could be observed in the blue bronze material K$_{0.3}$MoO$_3$ doped with charged impurities such as Vanadium.