TRR 288:  Elastic Tuning and Response of Electronic Quantum Phases of Matter (ELASTO-Q-MAT)

• Subject Area: Physics
• Term: since 2020
• Website: Homepage
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 422213477

The ELASTO-Q-MAT initiative, embodied by this CRC/TRR 288, has the goal to understand, advance, and exploit new physical phenomena emerging from a particularly strong coupling between a material's elasticity and its electronic quantum phases. To this end, we will study the effects of elastic tuning and elastic response of various types of electronic order in representative classes of quantum materials that share a high sensitivity to intrinsic strain or externally applied stress fields. Prominent electronic orders that we will investigate are magnetism, charge and orbital order, nematic order, superconductivity, electronic ferroelectricity and topological quantum states. Physical phenomena that we will examine include non-linear and non-equilibrium elasticity, magneto-elastoresistivity, critical elasticity, and superelasticity due to volume-collapse transitions. We will employ the elastic response to manipulate symmetry-breaking phases, switch between phases and advance new techniques such as site-selective phononics. By combining materials design (in part guided by theory), synthesis, and characterization, with novel approaches to mechanically manipulate and control electronic systems, we aim at simultaneously tailoring elastic responsiveness and electronic properties. For this purpose, we apply both well-established and recently developed experimental techniques and theoretical methods -some of them uniquely available in this CRC/TRR. This initiative brings together researchers from three universities and two institutes of the Max-Planck Society that have made crucial contributions to the field, have a record of numerous collaborations between the groups, and contribute to this initiative with complementary experimental and theoretical expertise. Our long-term goals are i) to develop a systematic understanding of physical phenomena that are the result of a strong coupling between electronic orders and the crystalline lattice, over a wide range of time scales, and ii) to design, understand, and advance electronic quantum materials with exceptional mechanical responsiveness, and to explore the potential of such interacting systems to create new functionalities that enable or facilitate interfacing between mechanical and electronic properties.

• DFG Programme: CRC/Transregios

Current projects

• A01 - Strong electron-lattice coupling in correlated intermetallic compounds near valence- and structural instabilities (Project Heads Lang, Michael ;  Wolf, Bernd )
• A02 - Uniaxial- and biaxial-strain-induced phase switching of itinerant AT2X2-type antiferromagnets (Project Heads Böhmer, Anna E. ;  Meingast, Christoph )
• A03 - Single crystal growth of correlated intermetallic compounds with strong electron-lattice coupling (Project Heads Kliemt, Kristin ;  Krellner, Cornelius )
• A04 - Strain effects in thin films of correlated intermetallic compounds (Project Head Huth, Michael )
• A05 - Interplay of lattice, charge and spin degrees of freedom from first principles (Project Head Valenti, Maria Roser )
• A06 - Elastic effects in strongly correlated molecule-based systems with geometrical frustration (Project Head Lang, Michael )
• A07 - Theoretical approaches to electron-phonon coupling in strongly correlated systems (Project Heads Kopietz, Peter ;  Schmalian, Jörg )
• A08 - NV-center spectroscopy for strain sensing of non-collinear antiferromagnets (Project Heads Sürgers, Christoph ;  Wernsdorfer, Ph.D., Wolfgang )
• A09 - Control of relativistic magneto-elastoresistivity by electron-lattice and spin-orbit coupling (Project Heads Gomonay, Olena ;  Sinova, Ph.D., Jairo )
• A10 - Uniaxial stress-strain relationship of electronic materials in the non-linear regime (Project Heads Hicks, Ph.D., Clifford ;  Mackenzie, Andrew )
• A11 - Quantum materials with strong elastic coupling: critical elasticity, crystal grains and surfaces (Project Head Garst, Markus )
• B01 - Dynamics and noise of disordered strain-coupled electronic order (Project Head Schmalian, Jörg )
• B02 - Interplay of slow charge carrier dynamics and elastic effects in correlated multi-phase systems via noise spectroscopy (Project Head Müller, Jens )
• B03 - Elastic tuning of competing orders in correlated superconductors (Project Heads Haghighirad, Amir-Abbas ;  Hicks, Ph.D., Clifford ;  Le Tacon, Matthieu )
• B04 - Momentum microscopy of strongly correlated systems under strain (Project Head Elmers, Hans-Joachim )
• B05 - Correlations and relativistic effects in elastic tunable electronic systems (Project Heads Sinova, Ph.D., Jairo ;  Valenti, Maria Roser )
• B06 - Static and dynamic coupling of lattice and electronic degrees of freedom in magnetically ordered transition metal dichalcogenides (Project Heads Mokrousov, Yuriy ;  Wulfhekel, Wulf )
• B07 - Phonon-driven control of electronic properties in hybrid perovskites and organic charge-transfer salts (Project Heads Bonn, Mischa ;  Kim, Heejae )
• B08 - Manipulation of broken-symmetry ground states by transient lattice distortions (Project Heads Demsar, Jure ;  Roskos, Hartmut G. )
• B09 - Dynamics of strongly coupled electron-phonon systems (Project Heads Marino, Ph.D., Jamir ;  Pientka, Falko )
• Z - Central Tasks of the Transregional Collaborative Research Center (Project Head Valenti, Maria Roser )

• Applicant Institution: Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main
• Co-Applicant Institution: Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz; Karlsruher Institut für Technologie
• Participating Institution: Max-Planck-Institut für Chemische Physik fester Stoffe; Max-Planck-Institut für Polymerforschung
• Spokesperson: Professorin Dr. Maria Roser Valenti