Influence of the electronic structure on the transport properties of some iron pnictides

AbstractAn important feature of the iron-based pnictides is their multi-band electronic structure with both electron and hole bands at the Fermi level. The size of these pockets can be changed by different types of substitution, resulting in a variety of original magnetic and electronic properties. The contributions of both types of carriers will thus have important consequences on the evolution of the transport properties versus temperature and doping. It has been pointed out that Hund's rule interaction plays a prominent role in the physics of these compounds by allowing a strong orbital differentiation between the 3d Fe orbitals. As a result, a description in terms of more or less correlated electrons was proposed and may have important consequences on the scattering lifetimes of the different carriers. Finally, the presence of very flat bands at the Fermi level may induce a semiconductor-like behavior, with a change in carrier concentration with temperature. In this paper, we will review the evolution of transport properties with chemical doping/substitution in iron pnictides. We will more particularly focus on the 122 family (Ba(Sr,Ca)Fe2As2) and the 111 LiFeAs compound for which sizeable single crystals required for transport measurements are available. The combined resistivity, Hall effect and magnetoresistance data will be analyzed in association with electronic structure calculations, angle-resolved photoemission measurements and quantum oscillations. In spite of the strong interplay between antiferromagnetism and superconductivity in most part of their phase diagram, direct signatures of spin fluctuations are difficult to identify in the transport properties of iron pnictides. We will show that measurements of the longitudinal magnetoresistance provide a powerful tool for studying the coupling between the charge carriers and the spin degrees of freedom