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Physical Society Colloquium[an error occurred while processing this directive]
Louis Taillefer
Physics Dept The theory of quasiparticle transport in unconventional superconductors has been actively developed over the last ten years, yet it remains largely untested. In recent studies, the technique of heat transport has been used successfully to shed light on various aspects of electron behavior, in all three families of unconventional superconductors: the heavy fermion metals, the organic conductors and the high Tc cuprates. At McGill University, we have used the conduction of heat in the cuprates to test one of the central predictions of the theory: the existence of a residual normal fluid, at low temperatures deep into the superconducting state. I will present some of the basic properties of this novel fluid -- including its sensitivity to impurities and behavior in a magnetic field -- and describe the often excellent agreement we find with recent calculations assuming a d-wave gap. I will also show how the anisotropy of heat transport in the heavy-fermion compound UPt3 has allowed us to determine the symmetry of the order parameter in this metallic analog of superfluid 3He.
Friday, February 13th, 15:30 |