Non-analytic spin susceptibility of a nested Fermi liquid: the case of Fe-based pnictides

Abstract

We propose an explanation of the peculiar linear temperature dependence of the uniform spin susceptibility $\chi(T)$ in ferropnictides. We argue that the linear in $T$ term appears due to non-analytic temperature dependence of $\chi(T)$ in a two-dimensional Fermi liquid. We show that the prefactor of the $T$ term is expressed via the square of the spin-density-wave (SDW) amplitude connecting nested hole and electron pockets. Due to an incipient SDW instability, this amplitude is large, which, along with a small value of the Fermi energy, makes the $T$ dependence of $\chi(T)$ strong. We demonstrate that this mechanism is in quantitative agreement with the experiment.