Journal Article

Superconductivity emerging from a stripe charge order in IrTe2 nanoflakes

Kim, So Young, Kim, Hoon, Choi, Gyu Seung, Taniguchi, Takashi, Kim, Hyoung Kug, Talantsev, Evgeny F., Kim, Jun Sung, Kim, Taeho, Park, Sungyu, Kim, Min Jeong, Kim, B. J., Yeom, H. W., Kim, Jonghwan, Cheong, Sang-Wook, Kim, Tae-Hwan, Won, C. J., Kim, Kyoo, Watanabe, Kenji, Kim, Sooran

2021

Overview

Superconductivity in the vicinity of a competing electronic order often manifests itself with a superconducting dome, centered at a presumed quantum critical point in the phase diagram. This common feature, found in many unconventional superconductors, has supported a prevalent scenario in which fluctuations or partial melting of a parent order are essential for inducing or enhancing superconductivity. Here we present a contrary example, found in IrTe 2 nanoflakes of which the superconducting dome is identified well inside the parent stripe charge ordering phase in the thickness-dependent phase diagram. The coexisting stripe charge order in IrTe 2 nanoflakes significantly increases the out-of-plane coherence length and the coupling strength of superconductivity, in contrast to the doped bulk IrTe 2 . These findings clarify that the inherent instabilities of the parent stripe phase are sufficient to induce superconductivity in IrTe 2 without its complete or partial melting. Our study highlights the thickness control as an effective means to unveil intrinsic phase diagrams of correlated van der Waals materials. Superconductivity often appears due to suppression of competing electronic orders. Here, the authors present a contrary example showing a superconducting dome inside the parent phase with a stripe charge order in IrTe 2 nanoflakes and identify their unusual superconducting properties.

• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group UK,Nature Publishing Group,Nature Portfolio
• Subject: 639/301/119/1003 / 639/301/119/544 / 639/301/357/1018 / Coherence length / Cooling / Critical point / Domes / Humanities and Social Sciences / Laboratories / Materials science / Melting / multidisciplinary / Phase diagrams / Phase transitions / Physics / Science / Science (multidisciplinary) / Science education / Spectrum analysis / Superconductivity / Temperature / Thermal cycling / Thickness / Unconventional superconductors