Universal behaviour and the two-component character of magnetically underdoped cuprate superconductors

We present a detailed review of scaling behaviour in the magnetically underdoped cuprate superconductors (hole dopings less than 0.20) and show that it reflects the presence of two coupled components throughout this doping regime: a non-Landau Fermi liquid and a spin liquid whose behaviour maps onto the theoretical Monte Carlo calculations of the two-dimensional Heisenberg model of localized Cu spins for most of its temperature domain. We use this mapping to extract the doping dependence of the strength, f(x) of the spin liquid component and the effective interaction, J eff(x) between the remnant localized spins that compose it; we find that both decrease linearly with x as the doping level increases. We discuss the physical origin of pseudogap behaviour and conclude that it is consistent with scenarios in which the both the large energy gaps found in the normal state and their subsequent superconductivity are brought about by the coupling between the Fermi liquid quasiparticles and the spin liquid excitations, and that differences in this coupling between the 1–2–3 and 2–1–4 materials can explain the measured differences in their superconducting transition temperatures and other properties.