Pseudogap phase in the U(1) gauge theory with incoherent spinon pairs

TL;DR

This paper investigates the pseudogap phase in underdoped high-temperature superconductors using a U(1) gauge theory of the t-J model, highlighting how spinon pairing fluctuations lead to a stable, phase-incoherent spin gap phase that explains experimental resistivity suppression.

Contribution

It introduces a gauge theory framework incorporating spinon pairing fluctuations to explain the pseudogap phase as a stable, incoherent spin gap state in high-$T_c$ superconductors.

Findings

The phase fluctuation suppresses low-lying gauge fluctuations.

A stable, phase incoherent spin gap phase emerges below T*.

Resistivity is suppressed below T*, consistent with experiments.

Abstract

The pseudogap effect of underdoped high-$T_c$ superconductors is studied in the U(1) gauge theory of the t-J model including the spinon pairing fluctuation. The gauge fluctuation breaks the long range correlation between the spinon pairs. The pairing fluctuation, however, suppresses significantly the low-lying gauge fluctuations and leads to a stable but phase incoherent spin gap phase which is responsible for the pseudogap effects. This quantum disordered spin gap phase emerges below a characteristic temperature $T^{*}$ which is determined by the effective potential for the spinon pairing gap amplitude. The resistivity is suppressed by the phase fluctuation below $% T^{*}$, consistent with experiments.