The role of superconducting fitness in pairing from fluctuating order

Abstract

In many unconventional superconductors the pairing interaction is believed to be mediated by a fluctuating order. Although this is typically taken to be magnetic in origin, the role of other fluctuating orders has recently been considered. In this work we examine the weak-coupling pairing interaction produced by a general fluctuating order, and seek to identify the leading pairing instability. For a given pairing channel, we show that the superconducting fitness with the associated static order appears prominently in the expression for the coupling constant. We consequently argue that fit gaps (for which the static order is not pair-breaking) should have an attractive interaction, whereas unfit gaps (for which the static order is pair-breaking) have a repulsive interaction. We propose a simple heuristic test for the tendency of a given pairing state to have an attractive interaction. We show the validity of this test in the case of pairing caused by fluctuating density-wave order, and use it to probe the superconducting state generated by a fluctuating noncolinear magnetic order on the pyrochlore lattice.