Superconductivity and non-Fermi-liquid behavior of Ce2PdIn8

Abstract

The electrical resistivity of the heavy fermion superconductor Ce2PdIn8 was measured in magnetic fields up to 12 T and under hydrostatic pressures up to 21 kbar. At zero field, the low-temperature electrical resistivity in the normal state exhibits a power-law behavior ρ0+ATn with n<2. In this non-Fermi-liquid regime, both the superconducting temperature Tc and the coefficient A= decrease with increasing pressure, while the exponent n and the resistivity maximum at Tmax increase. The findings indicate a destabilization of the superconducting state via increasing hybridization strength between the 4f and conduction electrons. In concert, enlargement of the f-band width at the Fermi level results in a decrease of the density of states N(EF). Application of magnetic fields recovers the Fermi-liquid state at Hc2, at which both A and ρ0 show a tendency to diverge. The data obtained indicate that any change in the Kondo interaction strength in Ce2PdIn8 by applied pressure or quenching spin fluctuations by external magnetic fields results in pushing away the system from the non-Fermi-liquid regime concomitantly with the destruction of the superconducting state. These new results support a scenario in which the superconductivity in Ce2PdIn8 is driven by antiferromagnetic spin fluctuations in the vicinity of an underlying quantum critical point.

Source-reported materials — not catalogue approval

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