Kontrollskrivning 3 - Solutions, Solid State Physics, May 20th, 2005

the Fermi Surface and which can be 1. a) The reciprocal lattice vectors are obtained from . The density of lattice points is so the fermi wector is . By bisecting the shortest reciprocal lattice vectors we obtain the rst and second Brillouin zone (BZ). Since the distance to the BZ boundary is in the -direction and in the -direction, the free electron fermi surface will cross the boundary in the - but not in the -direction as illustrated in gure 1. 1.b) When a weak potential is introduced we have nearly free electrons and the following points should be considered when constructing the fermi surface.

The fermi surface crosses BZ boundaries perpendicular to the boundary

The fermi surface cannot very continuously over the BZ boundary since this implies that close to the BZ boundary the energy would be in the 1st BZ and in the 2nd BZ. But both energies should be ! This means that theer is a jump in wave vector along the BZ boundary. Electrons outside the 1st BZ have higher energies than electrons in the 1st BZ with the same . Electrons should thus move from the 2nd to the 1st BZ such that the volume of the fermi sphere is constant.

With these rules in mind the free electron fermi surface is deformed (qualitatively) according to gure 1. 1. c) The construction are obtained by (i) repeating the 1st BZ throughout space, and (ii) translating the 2nd BZ to the 1st with the reciprocal lattice vectors and repeating it. See gure 2.

k 1st BZ 2nd BZ

b2 = (2 / a) y

b1 = (4 / a) x

Fig. 1. Reciprocal lattice, rst two Brillouin zones (magenta and yellow), ree electron fermi surface (red) and expected fermi surface in the nearly free electron model (green).

5       82@988676& "! #    Y a ` H QP B B VP H

G " 

   

G   B CA F& E   D% ' % (&$ ) 4"21)0 3 W Y WX

T R USB9P

I I I

Fig. 2. Portions of the fermi surface in the 1st BZ (left) and 2nd BZ (right). Shaded regions correspond to lled electron states.

Fig. 3. Effect of stronger crystal potential on the fermi surface. The cyan (turkoise) curve show the effect of a stronger potential and the dotted line shows an extremal case where the potential is so strong that the entire fermi surface is contained in the rst BZ. 1. d) As the potential strength increases more electrons will avoid crossing the BZ boundary and the volume of the fermi surface in 1st BZ will increase at the expense of the volume in the 2nd BZ. If the potential is strong enough no electron states in the 2nd BZ will be lled and the fermi surface will be contained completely in the 1st BZ as illustrated in gure 3. Note that since the volume of the 1st BZ, is larger than the volume of the fermi sphere, , the whole fermi surface can be contained within the 1st BZ with plenty of free states. The material should thus still be a metallic.

Superconductivity 2. a) The Meissner effect implies that total magnetic eld in the superconductor is zero so that and hence . For a regular metal we may assume that the susceptibility is very small so and the free energy does not change as we increase the eld from 0 to

BA      F  F"    F

C" !  !        

   R

(1)

 H
0

Magnetization 0 M (T)

Hc1 H

c2

Magnetic field strength H (A/m)

However, for a superconductor the change in free energy is

Now set the applied eld equal to the critical eld, the superconductor is normal so that so the stabilization free energy is

2. b) The magnetization curve is shown in gure 4 and the area under the curve is easy to obtain if one remembers thow to calculate the area of a triangle, .

2. d) The following short descriptions sufce:

Energy gap: a forbidden range in the energy spectrum for electrons. No electron states exist exist in the gap. Dimension: meV (or eV or J or ...)

Coherence length: length over which all quantities associated with the energy gap vary. Approximately corresponds to electron-electron distance. Dimension: (or m or ...).

Penetration depth: length over which electromagnetic quantities such as magnetic eld and current density vary. Dimension: (or m or ...).

Flux quantum: The total magnetic ux through a superconducting ring is quantized and exist only in integer multiples of the ux quanta. A single vortex in a type II superconductor carries a magnetic ux equal to one ux quanta. Dimension: Tm (or Wb or Vs).

2. c) See gure 4. Vortices start to penetrate at at .

and the eld penetrates homogenously

   !  88 5

 C" !  !      5 R    88 C"                        C"         5

  5 C"  !C" !   

Fig. 4. Magnetization versus applied eld and type II superconductor (full).

 

for: type I superconductor (dotted)

(2)

. At the critical eld . But

 


(3)


I I I I

Dielectrics

Since is concentration of atoms it could conceivably be given in mol or kg . To remember the unit of polarization it helps to go in steps and write polarization as dipole moment per volume, and dipole moment as charge times separation. 3. b) The meaning of the terms are:

: the macroscopic eld, the sum of applied eld and depolarization eld.

: the Lorenz eld from polarization carges on the surface of a spherical cavity cut (as a mathematical ction) from the crystral with the reference atom as center. : the eld from dipoles within the cavity.

Magnetism 4. a) Without eld there are an equal concentration of atoms in the and direction, so . Under applied eld the energy levels shift as illustrated in gure 5 B adn if then the darkly shaded region, above the fermi energy, has the concentration of atoms . This approximation thus assume that the density of states does not vary much around the fermi energy. In equilibrium the electron above the fermi energy will ip their spin and move to the spin band as illustrated in gure 5 C. The number of electrons in each band is thus , . The magnetization is thus

(5)

and the Pauli susceptibility of conduction electrons

(6)

4. b) The 4 electron of copper is in the conduction band and thus has no free spin paramagnetism. Instead it gives a contribution according to 4. a). But -bands are free electron like with space for only 2 electrons and this band is half-lled. The density of states at the fermi level is thus low. The dimagnetic contribution is given by that of Argon ( ) since these are the lled shells of Cu.

B 9P 9P B R  89 &'"  8  89 '!" 8 0  !  & 

!") 9P B

5 B 9P %  '("88   '""  & !  & !

! "

1 2

B 9P

B 9P  &  

  &'!      "

  

 !

3 4

B 9P

# ! $

3. a) The dimension of

is As Vm m m m As V m (4)

  8  

P  Q & I

 I  I

Fig. 5. Illustration of the behavior of conduction electrons in applied magnetic eld. 4. c) For particles with magnetic moment the magnetization is

If you cannot remember this expression you should derive it. When 80 % of the spins are in the lowest energy states, 20 % of the spins are in the opposite direction and the magnetization is thus 60 % of the saturation magnetization, . Introduce and we have

which gives . The magnetic eld required is thus T. This eld is eqasily accessible in a laboratory setting with e.g. a superconducting magnet. 4. d) In a ferromagnet exchange eld is and the total eld is thus where is the paramagnetic susceptibility which is . and solving for the magnetization gives the We can write ferromagnetic susceptibility

The susceptibility diverges at the critical temperatures . An easy way of interpreting the data is plotting versus since the slope of this linear function gives and the intercept at gives . From gure 6 we obtain K and and thus K.

10 3  ) & !

A    @#! 4" @ !

 

 8 4B   % )  % A % 8  2  5 )  % )  7 @6 3  5 %45   )

  A  "

H   R H      H     H         

%4)3   ! 3 )

! "

  ! % $

 R ! 2    % ) R '3 & '3  $ 4(! ! &


H   & "  A !

#" H !

@9 5 )

! ""

and the energy levels in magnetic eld

(7)

(8)

(9)

1000 CurieWeiss law = C / ( T C) gives 800 1 / = (1 / C ) T Linear fit yields

Inverse susceptibility 1 /

600

1 / C = 0.66 and = 290 so that

400

C = 1.5 K and T = C = 440 K

c

200

200 0 200 400 600 800 1000 1200 1400 1600 1800 2000

Temperature T (K)

Fig. 6. Inverse susceptibility versus temperature for a ferromagnet above the Curie temperature. The saturation magnetization (magnetization at absolute zero) is and with we get . At absolute zero the exchange eld can be written T. This (ctional) eld is much larger than any eld we can produce and maintain at earth.

5   4) C" 

  A   $ C"   %  C"8!  B  4" @C"