Speaker: Andrey Chubukov, University of Wisconsin Department of Physics
Abstract: The theory of superconductivity, for which the Nobel Prize was given in 1972, named electron-phonon interaction as a glue that overcomes Coulomb repulsion and binds fermions into pairs which then condense and super-conduct. I review recent and not so recent works aiming to understand whether a nominally repulsive Coulomb interaction can by itself give rise to a superconductivity. I will first discuss a generic scenario of the pairing by electron-electron interaction, put forward by Kohn and Luttinger back in 1965 in their attempt to explain superfluidity in 3He, and then move on to discuss modern studies of the electronic mechanisms of superconductivity in the cuprates, Fe-pnictides, and even in graphene.