Nodal-antinodal dichotomy from anisotropic quantum critical continua in holographic models

Abstract

We demonstrate that the absence of stable quasiparticle excitations on parts of the Fermi surface, similar to the “nodal-antinodal dichotomy” in underdoped cuprate superconductors, can be reproduced in models of strongly correlated electrons defined via a holographic dual. We show analytically that the anisotropy of the quantum critical continuum, which is a feature of these models, may lead to washing out the quasiparticle peak in one direction while leaving it intact in the perpendicular one. The effect relies on the qualitatively different scaling of the self-energy in different directions. Using the explicit example of the anisotropic Q-lattice model, we demonstrate how this effect emerges due to specific features of the near horizon geometry of the black hole in the dual description.