Edwin Herrera
URu2Si2 is a heavy fermion system which crystallizes in a tetragonal structure and where superconductivity emerges inside the misterious hidden order phase. The latter consists of a still unknown type of order that appears together with a strong entropy reduction below 17.5 K. URu2Si2 becomes superconducting below 1.5 K. The hidden order phase is characterized by dynamical spin modes at q0=(0 0 1) and q1=(0.6 0 0). These quench into an antiferromagnetic order under pressure (q0=(0 0 1)) and at high magnetic fields (q1=(0.6 0 0)). Here I will show recent Scanning Tunneling Microscopy experiments (STM) at very low temperatures (0.1 K). I will report on the discovery of a charge modulation with a wavevector that is a moiré combination of the atomic lattice periodicity and q1, produced by fracturing the crystal in presence of the dynamical spin mode at q1. Our results suggest that charge interactions are a fundamental ingredient that competes with hidden order in URu2Si2 and advance controlled fracture as powerful means to obtain ground states derived from strong electronic correlations [1]. Furthermore, I will show results at surfaces with large amounts of atomically flat steps showing the U fourfold lattice. There we find a new heavy fermion 2D-electron gas type of surface state with an effective mass 17 times the free electron mass. We discuss lateral quantization of such 2D heavy electrons and the interaction of the surface band with bulk superconductivity.
[1] E. Herrera, et. al., One-dimensional moire charge density wave in the hidden order state of URu2Si2 induced by fracture, arXiv:2003.07881v2 (2020).