Paper detail

Optical Integral and Sum Rule Violation

The purpose of this work is to investigate the role of the lattice in the optical Kubo sum rule in the cuprates. We compute conductivities, optical integrals W, and ΔW between superconducting and normal states for 2-D systems with lattice dispersion typical of the cuprates for four different models -- a dirty BCS model, a single Einstein boson model, a marginal Fermi liquid model, and a collective boson model with a feedback from super-conductivity on a collective boson. The goal of the paper is two-fold. First, we analyze the dependence of W on the upper cut-off w_c placed on the optical integral because in experiments W is measured up to frequencies of order bandwidth. For a BCS model, the Kubo sum rule is almost fully reproduced at w_c equal to the bandwidth. But for other models only 70%-80% of Kubo sum rule is obtained up to this scale and even less so for ΔW, implying that the Kubo sum rule has to be applied with caution. Second, we analyze the sign of ΔW. In all models we studied ΔW is positive at small w_c, then crosses zero and approaches a negative value at large w_c, i.e. the optical integral in a superconductor is smaller than in a normal state. The point of zero crossing, however, increases with the interaction strength and in a collective boson model becomes comparable to the bandwidth at strong coupling. We argue that this model exhibits the behavior consistent with that in the cuprates.