Journal article
Ubiquitous spin freezing in the superconducting state of UTe2
- Abstract:
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In most superconductors electrons form Cooper pairs in a spin-singlet state mediated by either phonons or by long-range interactions such as spin fluctuations. The superconductor UTe2 is a rare material wherein electrons are believed to form pairs in a unique spin-triplet state with potential topological properties. While spin-triplet pairing may be mediated by ferromagnetic or antiferromagnetic fluctuations, experimentally, the magnetic properties of UTe2 are unclear. By way of muon spin rotation/relaxation (μSR) measurements on independently grown UTe2 single crystals we demonstrate the existence of magnetic clusters that gradually freeze into a disordered spin frozen state at low temperatures. Our findings suggest that inhomogeneous freezing of magnetic clusters is linked to the ubiquitous residual linear term in the temperature dependence of the specific heat (C) and the low-temperature upturn in C/T versus T. The omnipresent magnetic inhomogeneity has potential implications for experiments aimed at establishing the intrinsic low-temperature properties of UTe2.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 3.3MB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.1038/s42005-023-01146-8
Authors
- Funder identifier:
- http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000266
- Grant:
- EP/N023803/1
- Publisher:
- Springer Nature
- Journal:
- Communications Physics More from this journal
- Volume:
- 6
- Article number:
- 24
- Publication date:
- 2023-02-01
- Acceptance date:
- 2023-01-23
- DOI:
- EISSN:
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2399-3650
- Language:
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English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
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1329554
- Local pid:
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pubs:1329554
- Deposit date:
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2023-05-05
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Sundar et al.
- Copyright date:
- 2023
- Rights statement:
- Copyright © 2023, The Author(s). This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
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