Scale-covariant liquid in nonlocal high Tc strange metals

Experiments in recent years on high $T_c$ superconductors find a puzzling nodal scale-covariant self-energy with an exponent varying continuously with doping. We propose a mechanism: nonlocality induced by poorly screened effective repulsions $V_{\alpha}(r) \sim 1/r^\alpha$, where a continuously doping-dependent exponent $1 \le \alpha \le 3$ naturally interpolates between the Mott insulating and Fermi liquid limits. We develop a phenomenology of hydrodynamic screening, finding a scale-covariant quasiparticle decay rate $\Gamma(\omega,T) \propto T^{\gamma} \Phi(\omega/T)$ in energy $\omega$ and temperature $T$, with $\gamma = 2-\frac{1}{\alpha}$ for nonlocal $1 < \alpha < 2$. Our results naturally capture the optimally doped to overdoped regimes, whereas the underdoped regime is qualitatively distinct. In our theory, spectroscopy-fitted exponents directly probe the charged fluid's effective spatial nonlocality. Nonlocality shows that quantum criticality is not necessary to explain scale-covariant phenomena.