Overcoming the thermal regime for the electric-field driven Mott transition in vanadium sesquioxide - Université de Tours Access content directly
Journal Articles Nature Communications Year : 2019

Overcoming the thermal regime for the electric-field driven Mott transition in vanadium sesquioxide

Abstract

The complex interplay among electronic, magnetic and lattice degrees of freedom in Mott-Hubbard materials leads to different types of insulator-to-metal transitions (IMT) which can be triggered by temperature, pressure, light irradiation and electric field. However, several questions remain open concerning the quantum or thermal nature of electric field-driven transition process. Here, using intense terahertz pulses, we reveal the emergence of an instantaneous purely-electronic IMT in the Mott-Hubbard vanadium sequioxide (V2O3) prototype material. While fast electronics allow thermal-driven transition involving Joule heating, which takes place after tens of picoseconds, terahertz electric field is able to induce a sub-picosecond electronic switching. We provide a comprehensive study of the THz induced Mott transition, showing a crossover from a fast quantum dynamics to a slower thermal dissipative evolution for increasing temperature. Strong-field terahertz-driven electronic transition paves the way to ultrafast electronic switches and high-harmonic generation in correlated systems.

Dates and versions

hal-02525677 , version 1 (31-03-2020)

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Flavio Giorgianni, Joe Sakai, Stefano Lupi. Overcoming the thermal regime for the electric-field driven Mott transition in vanadium sesquioxide. Nature Communications, 2019, 10 (1159), ⟨10.1038/s41467-019-09137-6⟩. ⟨hal-02525677⟩
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