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Bragg glass signatures in PdxErTe3 with X-ray diffraction temperature clustering

Cornell Affiliated Author(s)

Author

Krishnanand Mallayya
Joshua Straquadine
Matthew Krogstad
Maja Bachmann
Anisha Singh
Raymond Osborn
Stephan Rosenkranz
Ian Fisher
Eun-Ah Kim

Abstract

The Bragg glass phase is a nearly perfect crystal with glassy features predicted to occur in vortex lattices and charge-density-wave systems in the presence of disorder. Detecting it has been challenging, despite its sharp theoretical definition in terms of diverging correlation lengths. Here we present bulk probe evidence supporting a Bragg glass phase in the systematically disordered charge-density-wave material of PdxErTe3. We do this by using comprehensive X-ray data and a machine-learning-based analysis tool called X-ray diffraction temperature clustering (X-TEC). We establish a diverging correlation length in samples with moderate intercalation over a wide temperature range. To enable this analysis, we introduced a high-throughput measure of inverse correlation length that we call peak spread. The detection of Bragg glass order and the resulting phase diagram advance our understanding of the complex interplay between disorder and fluctuations. Moreover, the use of our analysis technique to target fluctuations through a high-throughput measure of peak spread can revolutionize the study of fluctuations in scattering experiments.

Date Published

Journal

Nature Physics

ISBN Number

1745-2481

URL

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-023-02380-1

DOI

10.1038/s41567-023-02380-1

Alternate Journal

Nature Physics

Group (Lab)

Funding Source

DE-SC0018946
GBMF10436
DE-AC02-76SF00515

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