Universal chemical formula dependence of ab initio low-energy effective Hamiltonian in single-layer carrier-doped cuprate superconductors: Study using a hierarchical dependence extraction algorithm

We explore the possibility to control the superconducting transition temperature at optimal hole doping Tcopt in cuprates by tuning the chemical formula (CF). Tcopt can be theoretically predicted from the parameters of the low-energy effective Hamiltonian with one antibonding (AB) Cu3dx2−y2/O2pσ orbital per Cu atom in the CuO2 plane, notably the nearest-neighbor hopping amplitude |t1| and the ratio u=U/|t1|, where U is the onsite effective Coulomb repulsion. However, the CF dependence of |t1| and u is a highly nontrivial question. In this paper, we propose the universal dependence of |t1| and u on the CF and structural features in hole doped cuprates with a single CuO2 layer sandwiched between block layers. To do so, we perform extensive calculations of |t1| and u and analyze the results by employing a machine-learning method called hierarchical dependence extraction (HDE). The main results are (a) |t1| has a main-order dependence on the radii RX and RA of the apical anion X and cation A in the block layer. (|t1| increases when RX or RA decreases.) (b) u has a main-order dependence on the ionic charge ZX of X and the hole doping δ of the AB orbital. (u decreases when |ZX| increases or δ increases.) We elucidate and discuss the microscopic mechanism of items (a) and (b). We demonstrate the predictive power of the HDE by showing the consistency between items (a) and (b) and results from previous works. The present results provide a basis for optimizing superconducting properties in cuprates and possibly akin materials. Also, the HDE method offers a general platform to identify dependencies between physical quantities. Published by the American Physical Society 2024