A mechanism for the strange metal phase in rare-earth intermetallic compounds

Abstract

Significance The elusive strange metal phase (ground state) was observed in a variety of quantum materials, notably in f -electron–based rare-earth intermetallic compounds. Its emergence has remained unclear. Here, we propose a generic mechanism for this phenomenon driven by the interplay of the gapless fermionic short-ranged antiferromagnetic spin correlation and critical bosonic charge fluctuations near a Kondo breakdown quantum phase transition. It is manifested as a fluctuating Kondo-scattering–stabilized critical (gapless) fermionic spin liquid. It shows ω / T scaling in dynamical electron scattering rate, a signature of quantum criticality. Our results on quasilinear-in-temperature scattering rate and logarithmic-in-temperature divergence in specific heat coefficient as temperature vanishes were recently seen in CePd 1 − x Ni x Al.