Renormalized Mean-field Theory For Interlayer Electron Tunneling Effects In Multilayer Cuprate Superconductors And Strongly Correlated Heterostructures

The electronic properties of a strongly correlated heterostructure consisting of t-J layer and metallic layer have been investigated by using the Gutzwiller projected mean-field approximation. Considering the proximity effect due to the large pseudogap energy scale of t-J layer, a large superconducting gap could be induced on the metallic layer. This enhanced superconducting gap may be even larger than that of the t-J layer. Related physical quantities including spectral functions and density of states are obtained. The consequences of these results on experiments are discussed.Recent angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) experiment on optimally doped trilayer cuprate superconductors Bi2223 has revealed a layer variation of both doping density and d-wave gap. In particular, two outer layers are overdoped with a gap which is larger than the gap for optimally doped single layer cuprates while the inner layer is underdoped with an even larger gap. Here we propose a minimal model composed of a triple-layer t-J model, a single elec-tron tunneling term as well as a Cooper pair tunneling term to investigate the superconducting and antiferromagnetic properties of trilayer high-Tc cuprates. Through solving extended multilayer t-J model, it is clearly revealed that the layer configurations of orderings play a crucial role to determine the phase dia-gram of such multiplane systems. Abrupt phase transitions between states with different configurational symmetries are manifested by tuning the doping level and/or tunneling strength. Due to the resultant cooperative tunneling processes between adjacent layers, we find that electrons favor to live in the inner CuO2 plane with a greatly enhanced pairing gap near the region of optimal doping, which is qualitatively consistent with recent ARPES experiments on Bi2223.