Thermal and electrical intralayer conductivities of underdoped cuprate superconductors from Fermi-pocket models

Abstract

Several models of the electronic spectrum in the pseudogap state of underdoped cuprates have been proposed to explain photoemission and tunneling measurements, which reveal only truncated Fermi pockets instead of a full metallic Fermi surface. We consider the transport properties expected of four physically distinct models, and calculate the thermal and electrical conductivity of the electronic quasiparticles. By proposing transport currents that reflect the close correspondence between quasiparticles on the Fermi pockets in the pseudogap and those near nodes in the superconducting state, we show that measurable transport coefficients provide stringent tests of pseudogap models.