High-sensitivity heat-capacity measurements on Sr₂RuO₄ under uniaxial pressure

• Published in: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS Vol. 118; no. 10; pp. 1 - 6
• Main Authors: Li, You-Sheng, Kikugawa, Naoki, Sokolov, Dmitry A., Jerzembeck, Fabian, Gibbs, Alexandra S., Maeno, Yoshiteru, Hicks, Clifford W., Schmalian, Jörg, Nicklas, Michael, Mackenzie, Andrew P.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Washington National Academy of Sciences 09.03.2021
• Subjects: Brillouin zones; Heat; Order parameters; Physical Sciences; Pressure; Specific heat; Strontium ruthenium oxide; Unconventional superconductivity
• ISSN: 0027-8424; 1091-6490; 1091-6490
• DOI: 10.1073/pnas.2020492118

A key question regarding the unconventional superconductivity of Sr₂RuO₄ remains whether the order parameter is single- or two-component. Under a hypothesis of two-component superconductivity, uniaxial pressure is expected to lift their degeneracy, resulting in a split transition. The most direct and fundamental probe of a split transition is heat capacity. Here, we report measurement of heat capacity of samples subject to large and highly homogeneous uniaxial pressure. We place an upper limit on the heat-capacity signature of any second transition of a few percent of that of the primary superconducting transition. The normalized jump in heat capacity, ΔC/C, grows smoothly as a function of uniaxial pressure, favoring order parameters which are allowed to maximize in the same part of the Brillouin zone as the wellstudied van Hove singularity. Thanks to the high precision of our measurements, these findings place stringent constraints on theories of the superconductivity of Sr₂RuO₄.