Phonon-induced giant linear-in-T resistivity in magic angle twisted bilayer graphene: Ordinary strangeness and exotic superconductivity

Abstract

We study the effect of electron-acoustic phonon interactions in twisted bilayer graphene on resistivity in the high-temperature transport and superconductivity in the low-temperature phase diagram. We theoretically show that twisted bilayer graphene should have an enhanced and strongly twist-angle dependent linear-in-temperature resistivity in the metallic regime with the resistivity magnitude increasing as the twist angle approaches the magic angle. The slope of the resistivity versus temperature could approach one hundred ohm per kelvin with a strong angle dependence, but with a rather weak dependence on the carrier density. This higher-temperature density-independent linear-in-T resistivity crosses over to a T4 dependence at a low density-dependent characteristic temperature, becoming unimportant at low temperatures. This angle-tuned resistivity enhancement arises from the huge increase in the effective electron-acoustic phonon coupling in the system due to the suppression of graphene Fermi velocity induced by the flat-band condition in the moiré superlattice system. Our calculated temperature dependence is reminiscent of the so-called “strange metal” transport behavior except that it is arising from the ordinary electron-phonon coupling in a rather unusual parameter space due to the generic moiré flat-band structure of twisted bilayer graphene. We also show that the same enhanced electron-acoustic phonon coupling also mediates effective attractive interactions in s,p,d, and f pairing channels with a theoretical superconducting transition temperature on the order of ∼5 K near magic angle. The fact that ordinary acoustic phonons can produce exotic non-s-wave superconducting pairing arises from the unusual symmetries of the system.

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