• DOI:10.1038/476037a
• Corpus ID: 27665903

High–temperature superconductivity: The great quantum conundrum

@article{Grant2011HightemperatureST,
  title={High–temperature superconductivity: The great quantum conundrum},
  author={Paul M. Grant},
  journal={Nature},
  year={2011},
  volume={476},
  pages={37-39}
}

• P. Grant
• Published 4 August 2011
• Physics
• Nature

Twenty-five years on from its discovery, high-temperature superconductivity remains without a satisfactory explanation. The latest studies on the electronic phase diagram of copper oxide compounds reveal why this is so. See Letter p.73
The relative importance of phenomena such as spin and charge (stripe) order and a pseudogap phase are still a matter of great debate with regard to the high-transition-temperature copper oxides. In electron-doped materials, the absence of a pseudogap phase in the underdoped region of the phase diagram and weaker electron correlations suggest that antiferromagnetic spin fluctuations are the dominant feature. Jin et al. report a study of magnetotransport in thin films of the electron-doped copper oxide La2 − xCexCuO4 (LCCO). They show that a linear-temperature (T-linear) scattering rate is correlated with the electron pairing. Comparison with similar behaviour found in organic superconductors strongly suggests that the T-linear resistivity is caused by spin-fluctuation scattering.