English

Electron-phonon coupling and exchange-correlation effects in superconducting ${\rm H_3S}$ under high pressure

Superconductivity 2015-11-30 v2 Strongly Correlated Electrons

Abstract

We investigate the H3S{\rm H_3S} phase of sulphur hydride under high pressure \simeq 200 GPa by means of {\it ab-initio} calculations within the framework of the density-functional theory (DFT) with the PBE0 hybrid exchange-correlation (ExcE_{\rm xc}) approximation. The choice of ExcE_{\rm xc} has the largest effect on the calculated electron-phonon coupling (EPC) matrix elements; the high pressure equation of state and phonon frequencies are only slightly modified. Mode-dependent EPC correction factors are determined from PBE0 using a frozen-phonon supercell approach, while standard density-functional perturbation theory is used to determine the EPC with PBE generalized-gradient approximation ExcE_{\rm xc}. Our principle finding is that the calculated PBE0 TcT_c is enhanced by 25\% compared to PBE. This is similar in magnitude, but in opposite direction, to the proposed suppression of TcT_c by anharmonic effects [Errea {\em et al., Phys. Rev. Lett.} {\bf 114}, 157004 (2015)]. Our calculations demonstrate the importance of considering exchange-correlation approximations for calculations of superconducting properties for this class of materials.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1509.01297,
  title  = {Electron-phonon coupling and exchange-correlation effects in superconducting ${\rm H_3S}$ under high pressure},
  author = {Matej Komelj and Henry Krakauer},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1509.01297},
  year   = {2015}
}