Effect of Doping-induced Disorder on Transition Temperature in High $T_c$ Cuprates

We study the effect of disorder induced by doping on the transition temperature in high $T_c$ cuprates. Since the impurity lies between the CuO$_2$ planes, the momentum transfer is restricted by small angle with a range of order of $1/(d k_F)$, where $k_F$ is the Fermi momentum and $d$ is the distance between the plane and the impurity. We find that the leading correction on the transition temperature in this case is in cubic order of $1/(d k_F)$, while the single particle scattering rate is linearly proportional to $1/(d k_F)$. Therefore, we conclude that the disorder induced by doping has rather small effect on $T_c$, while it could give large single particle scattering rate. We find that the reduction of $T_c$ is about $3-10$, using the single particle scattering rate ($150-450 K$) observed in the recent angle-resolved- photoemission-spectroscopy data on optimally doped Bi2212. The consequences of the small angle scattering in other physical quantities such as transport are also discussed.