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The GaAs probe tunneling method and its application to superconducting compounds and intermediate valence rare earth intermetallics

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Zeitschrift für Physik B Condensed Matter

Abstract

Thep-GaAs Schottky-barrier point-contact tunneling technique has been analyzed and characterized with respect to uniaxial pressure effects, surface contaminations and the background in the metal vs.p-GaAs tunnel spectra. The latter have been calculated assuming parabolic bands and it is shown that density of states effects are unimportant.

The method has been applied to the superconducting compounds LaAl2, YSe, ErRh4B4 and to the intermediate valence (IV) rare earth intermetallics YbAl2, YbInAu2, CeCu2Si2 and CeRu2. No anomalies as suggested by asymmetries in metal point-contact spectra of IV intermetallics have been found. Moreover, no indication of a strongly renormalized tunneling density of states like in the semiconductor-like IV materials SmB6, SmS and TmSe or in superconductors has been observed, except CeRu2. For the IV superconductor CeRu2 an energy gap 2Δ=3.3±0.3 meV has been deduced from the tunnel spectra.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. II. Physikalisches Institut, Universität zu Köln, Zülpicher Strasse 77, D-5000, Köln 41, Federal Republic of Germany

    W. Schmitt & G. Güntherodt

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  1. W. Schmitt
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  2. G. Güntherodt
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Dedicated to B. Mühlschlegel on the occasion of his 60th birthday

Work supported by Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, SFB125

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Schmitt, W., Güntherodt, G. The GaAs probe tunneling method and its application to superconducting compounds and intermediate valence rare earth intermetallics. Z. Physik B - Condensed Matter 60, 433–440 (1985). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01304465

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01304465

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