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We demonstrate an efficient numerical method for obtaining unique solutions to the Eilenberger equation for a mesoscopic or nanoscale superconductor. In particular, we calculate the local density of states of a circular d- wave island containing a single vortex. The “vortex shadow” effect is found to depend strongly on the quasiparticle energy in such small systems. We show how to construct by geometry quasiparticle trajectories confined in a finite-size system with specular reflections at the boundary, and we discuss the stability of the numerical solutions even in the case of vanishing order parameter as for nodal quasiparticles in a rf-wave superconductor or for quasiparticles passing through the vortex center with zero energy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We measured the temperature dependence of the in-plane polarized reflectivity spectra of twin-free Y1-xCaxBa2Cu3O7-δ single crystals with different Ca concentrations (x = 0, 0.11 and 0.16) from the optimally doped to heavily overdoped region. Low-energy optical conductivity spectra showed a Drude-like residual conductivity at temperatures far below the superconducting transition temperature, which indicates the presence of unpaired-normal carriers in the superconducting state. Comparing the spectra at a fixed Ca content or at a fixed doping level, we have revealed that the carrier overdoping increases unpaired carriers in addition to those induced by the Ca disorder. We also found the superconducting behavior of the one-dimensional CuO chains lot the Ca-free samples. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The electric field ionization of gallium acceptors in germanium was studied by using terahertz-pump-terahertz-probe spectroscopy. As the pump electric field increases, the distinct absorptions due to acceptor transitions centered at 2.0 and 2.2 THz decrease, and simultaneously, a free carrier response emerges in the lower frequency region. These behaviors clearly show that the terahertz-pump pulse ionizes neutral acceptors. The pump electric field dependence of the released hole density is reproduced by a model assuming direct field-assisted tunneling of acceptors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The excitation density dependence of photoluminescence (PL) blinking of single CdSe/ZnS quantum dots was studied by means of single-dot PL spectroscopy. As the excitation density increases, an intermediate state appears in addition to the highly emissive (ON) and nonemissive (OFF) states. The systematic study of the excitation density dependence of PL blinking behavior (PL intensity, probabilities of finding these states, time probability distributions, and PL spectra and lifetimes) suggests that the intermediate state can be attributed to a charged exciton (trion) state generated through biexciton generation and charging (ionization) of a quantum dot under a high-density excitation regime. Our results indicate that the biexciton generation is a precursor of the trion state and not of the OFF state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The dispersion of phonons in Ba1-xKxBiO3 along the (3 + q, 0, 0) direction in reciprocal space was determined for x = 0, 0.30, 0.37, and 0.52 using high-resolution inelastic x-ray scattering. The observed phonon energies near Γ were in good agreement with published optical data. It was found that two high-energy modes strongly soften near q = 0.25 when the system becomes metallic (x > 0.35). There was no softening in the insulating phase, even at x = 0.30, very near the metal-insulator transition. This suggests that the phonon softening is linked to the appearance of the Fermi surface. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Coherent phonons were observed in perovskite dielectrics LaAlO3 and KMnF3 using ultrafast polarization spectroscopy. Ultrafast dynamics and softening of phonon modes, which contribute to structural phase transitions, were studied. The temperature dependences of the phonon frequency and relaxation rate were obtained from the observed damped oscillation of coherent phonons. In LaAlO3, typical softening of the phonon frequency was observed toward the phase-transition temperature Tc (~750 K). The observed relaxation for the soft-mode phonons is explained well by a population decay due to anharmonic phonon-phonon coupling. In KMnF3, two structural phase-transition temperatures, Tc (= 187 K) and Tcm (~81 K), were found through birefringence measurement. At temperatures below Tcm, three modes of coherent phonons were observed and the phonon modes were found to undergo softening toward Tcm. The observed dependences of the coherent phonon signal on the pumping polarization and the temperature suggest an orthorhombic structure, instead of a monoclinic structure, at temperatures below Tcm. The sudden decrease in the phonon frequency at Tcm indicates the first-order character of the phase transition at Tcm. Notable changes in birefringence and phonon frequency were observed at around 90 K, but no distinct anomaly is found, which suggests that the structure undergoes continuous change. Above 100 K, the Eg mode in the tetragonal symmetry is found to undergo softening toward Tc1. A coherent phonon signal of relaxation type appears at around Tc1 and survives even at near room temperature, which suggests the existence of structural disorder even in the cubic symmetry above Tc1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]