Superconductivity in Materials under Extreme Conditions: An ab-initio Prediction from Density Functional Theory

Abstract

The relation between thermodynamically stable and electronic structure preparation is one of the fundamental questions in physics, geophysics and chemistry. Since the discovery of the novel structure, this has remained as one of the main questions regarding the very foundation of elemental metals. Needless to say this has also bearings on extreme conditions physics, where again the relation between structure and performance is of direct interest. Crystal structures have been mainly at ambient conditions, i.e. at room temperature and ambient pressure. Nevertheless it was realized early that there is also a fundamental relation between volume and structure, and that this dependence could be most fruitfully studied by means of high pressure experimental techniques. From a theoretical point of view this is an ideal type of experiment, since only the volume is changed, which is a very clean variation of the external conditions. Therefore, at least in principle, the theoretical approach remains the same irrespective of the high pressure loading of the experimental sample. Theoretical modeling is needed to explain the measured data on the pressure volume relationships in crystal structures. Among those physical properties manifested itself under high pressure, superconductivity has emerged as a prominent property affected by pressure. Several candidate structure of materials are explored by ab initio random structure searching (AIRSS). This has been carried out in combination with density functional theory (DFT). The remarkable solution of AIRSS is possible to expect a superconductivity under high pressure. This chapter provide a systematically review of the structural prediction and superconductivity in elemental metals, i.e. lithium, strontium, scandium, arsenic.