Electronic Structure of UTe2 Studied by Photoelectron Spectroscopy

Abstract

The electronic structure of the unconventional superconductor UTe2 was studied by resonant photoelectron spectroscopy (RPES) and angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (ARPES) with soft X-ray synchrotron radiation. The partial U 5f density of states of UTe2 were imaged by the U 4d–5f RPES and it was found that the U 5f state has an itinerant character, but there exists an incoherent peak due to the strong electron correlation effects. Furthermore, an anomalous admixture of the U 5f states into the Te 5p bands was observed at a higher binding energy, which cannot be explained by band structure calculations. On the other hand, the band structure of UTe2 was obtained by ARPES and its overall band structure were mostly explained by band structure calculations. These results suggest that the U 5f states of UTe2 have itinerant but strongly-correlated nature with enhanced hybridization with the Te 5p states.