2011/05/31 by Sean A. Hartnoll, Diego M. Hofman, Max A. Metlitski +1
Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Condensed matter physics #Electron #Fermi surface #Organic and Molecular Conductors Research #Physics #Physics of Superconductivity and Magnetism #Quantum and electron transport phenomena #Quantum mechanics #Quasiparticle #Scattering #Scattering rate #Spin (aerodynamics) #cond-mat.str-el #hep-th
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevb.84.125115
published as Physical Review B 84, 125115 (2011) · 72 pages, 23 figures
arxiv created 2011/05/31 · openalex publication_date 2011/09/09 · arxiv updated 2012/01/05 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
We study the frequency dependence of the electron self-energy and the optical conductivity in a recently developed field theory of the spin-density-wave quantum phase transition in two-dimensional metals. We focus on the interplay between the Fermi surface ``hot spots'' and the remainder of the ``cold'' Fermi surface. Scattering of electrons off the fluctuations of the spin-density-wave order parameter, \ensuremathφ, is strongest at the hot spots; we compute the conductivity due to this scattering in a rainbow approximation. We point out the importance of composite operators, built of products of the primary electron or \ensuremathφ fields: These have important effects also away from the hot spots. The simplest composite operator, \ensuremathφ2, leads to deviations from Landau Fermi-liquid behavior on the entire Fermi surface. We also find an intermediate frequency window in which the cold electrons lose their quasiparticle form due to effectively one-dimensional scattering processes. The latter processes are part of umklapp scattering, which leads to singular contributions to the optical conductivity at the lowest frequencies at zero temperature.