Gauge theory of high temperature superconductivity

Abstract

Superconductivity in the strongly correlated electronic systems described by the Hubbard model for slightly less than half-filled band is shown to arise from the condensation of charge + e holons which are bosons. The holon effective mass is found to be very close to that of the band electrons and they have a strong nearest neighbour repulsion induced by the spin fluctuations. They interact with an U(1) part of the collective SU(2) gauge field (named S-gauge field) of the spin system. This results in spontaneous symmetry breaking of the holon field and the appearance of the Anderson-Higgs phenomenon. The interesting possibility of the SU(2) gauge field-spinon coupled system retaining some gapless excitation spectrum inspite of the spontaneous symmetry breaking in the holon field is pointed out.