Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
---|---|---|---|---|
11019910 | Journal of Alloys and Compounds | 2019 | 6 Pages |
Abstract
La3Co4Sn13 is a superconducting material with transition temperature at Tc=2.70 K, which presents a superlattice structural transition at T*â150 K, a common feature for this class of compounds. However, for this material, it is not clear that at T* the lattice distortions arise from a charge density wave (CDW) or from a distinct microscopic origin. Interestingly, it has been suggested in isostructural non-magnetic intermetallic compounds that T* can be suppressed to zero temperature, by combining chemical and external pressure, and a quantum critical point is argued to be observed near these critical doping/pressure. Our study shows that application of pressure on single-crystalline La3Co4Sn13 enhances Tc and decreases T*. We observe thermal hysteresis loops for cooling/heating cycles around T* for Pâ³0.6 GPa, in electrical resistivity measurements, which are not seen in x-ray diffraction data. The hysteresis in electrical measurements may be due to the pinning of the CDW phase to impurities/defects, while the superlattice structural transition maintains its ambient pressure second-order transition nature under pressure. From our experiments we estimate that T* vanishes at around 5.5â¯GPa, though no quantum critical behavior is observed up to 2.53â¯GPa.
Related Topics
Physical Sciences and Engineering
Materials Science
Metals and Alloys
Authors
L. Mendonça-Ferreira, F.B. Carneiro, M.B. Fontes, E. Baggio-Saitovitch, L.S.I. Veiga, J.R.L. Mardegan, J. Strempfer, M.M. Piva, P.G. Pagliuso, R.D. dos Reis, E.M. Bittar,