Hirschfeld This award supports the PI, Peter Hirschfeld, of the University of Florida in a collaboration with Klaus Ziegler of the Department of Physics at the University of Augsburg, Germany. The research focus is on the investigation of the low-energy excitations in high-Tc superconductors and heavy-fermion materials in the presence of disorder. The project will use approximate methods for realistic modeling and rigorous methods for related, simplified models to investigate whether quasiparticles are localized in the superconducting state--currently an open and important question in the field. The project will also produce calculations that shed light on AC-transport properties, such as microwave absorption, which will be compared to experiment. The collaboration combines the complementary expertise of the German group in field theoretical models of disordered electrons and of the PI in unconventional superconductivity.
