Diagonal nematicity in the pseudogap phase of HgBa2CuO4+δ

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Abstract

The pseudogap phenomenon in the cuprates is arguably the most mysterious puzzle in the field of high-temperature superconductivity. The tetragonal cuprate HgBa2CuO4+δ, with only one CuO2 layer per primitive cell, is an ideal system to tackle this puzzle. Here, we measure the magnetic susceptibility anisotropy within the CuO2 plane with exceptionally high-precision magnetic torque experiments. Our key finding is that a distinct two-fold in-plane anisotropy sets in below the pseudogap temperature T*, which provides thermodynamic evidence for a nematic phase transition with broken four-fold symmetry. Surprisingly, the nematic director orients along the diagonal direction of the CuO2 square lattice, in sharp contrast to the bond nematicity along the Cu-O-Cu direction. Another remarkable feature is that the enhancement of the diagonal nematicity with decreasing temperature is suppressed around the temperature at which short-range charge-density-wave formation occurs. Our result suggests a competing relationship between diagonal nematic and charge-density-wave order in HgBa2CuO4+δ.

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Murayama, H., Sato, Y., Kurihara, R., Kasahara, S., Mizukami, Y., Kasahara, Y., … Matsuda, Y. (2019). Diagonal nematicity in the pseudogap phase of HgBa2CuO4+δ. Nature Communications, 10(1). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-11200-1

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