Single crystal NMR of high temperature superconductors

Cu NMR studies of the high temperature superconductor YBa2Cu3O(7-delta) (T sub c = 90 K) using a 1 mg single crystal is reported. Three types of measurements were made for both the plane and chain Cu crystallographic sites and with the static magnetic field placed successively along each of the three crystal axes a, b, and c: nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) lineshapes, spin-lattice relaxation, and transverse relaxation. From these measurements four NMR tensors are deduced: the magnetic shift tensor, the electric field gradient tensor, the spin-lattice relaxation rate tensor, and the transverse relaxation rate tensor. As a preliminary matter, the symmetries of the magnetic shift and electric field gradient tensors were used to assign the two families of NMR lines to their respective crystallographic sites. From an analysis of the electric field gradient tensors it is shown that both the plane and chain Cu have valences Cu(2+), giving a single hold in the Cu atomic d-shell. The spin-lattice relaxation rate and magnetic shift of the plane and chain Cu were analyzed; included were both analyses in which only normal state data were considered, and in which superconducting state measurements of magnetic shifts were considered as well. These analyses show that the plane Cu atom behaves very nearly as a local moment. The chain Cu is probably also in the local moment limit; however, its NMR properties are largely determined by its interaction with oxygen holes in the chain.