Temperature-Independent Cuprate Pseudogap from Planar Oxygen NMR

Abstract

Planar oxygen nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) relaxation and shift data from all cuprate superconductors available in the literature are analyzed. They reveal a temperature-independent pseudogap at the Fermi surface, which increases with decreasing doping in family-specific ways, i.e., for some materials, the pseudogap is substantial at optimal doping while for others it is nearly closed at optimal doping. The states above the pseudogap, or in its absence are similar for all cuprates and doping levels, and Fermi liquid-like. If the pseudogap is assumed exponential it can be as large as about 1500 K for the most underdoped systems, relating it to the exchange coupling. The pseudogap can vary substantially throughout a material, being the cause of cuprate inhomogeneity in terms of charge and spin, so consequences for the NMR analyses are discussed. This pseudogap appears to be in agreement with the specific heat data measured for the YBaCuO family of materials, long ago. Nuclear relaxation and shift show deviations from this scenario near Tc, possibly due to other in-gap states.