We report first-principles and strongly correlated calculations of the newly discovered heavy fermion superconductor UTe_{2}. Our analyses reveal three key aspects of its magnetic, electronic, and superconducting properties that include… Click to show full abstract
We report first-principles and strongly correlated calculations of the newly discovered heavy fermion superconductor UTe_{2}. Our analyses reveal three key aspects of its magnetic, electronic, and superconducting properties that include (i) a two-leg ladder-type structure with strong magnetic frustrations, which might explain the absence of long-range orders and the observed magnetic and transport anisotropy, (ii) quasi-two-dimensional Fermi surfaces composed of two separate electron and hole cylinders with similar nesting properties as in UGe_{2}, which may potentially promote magnetic fluctuations and help to enhance the spin-triplet pairing, and (iii) a unitary spin-triplet pairing state of strong spin-orbit coupling at zero field, with point nodes presumably on the heavier hole Fermi surface along the k_{x} direction, in contrast to the previous belief of nonunitary pairing. Our proposed scenario is in excellent agreement with latest thermal conductivity measurement and provides a basis for understanding the peculiar magnetic and superconducting properties of UTe_{2}.
               
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