Nl. Wang et al., Far-infrared study of the insulator-metal transition in kappa-(BEDT-TTF)(2)Cu(NCS)(2): evidence for polaron absorption, J PHYS-COND, 12(12), 2000, pp. 2867-2875
We present the infrared properties of kappa-(BEDT-TTF)(2)Cu(NCS)(2) for E p
arallel to b and E parallel to c focusing on the evolution of charge conduc
tion from high-T insulating to low-T metallic behaviour. Anomalous absorpti
on manifested in a broad peak in the optical conductivity at high temperatu
re is interpreted in terms of photon-assisted hopping of small polarons. A
sharp Drude peak that develops at low temperature, together with large mid-
infrared spectral weight in the conductivity, are attributed to coherent an
d incoherent bands of large polarons. The insulator-metal transition can be
understood as a crossover from localized small-polaron to coherent large-p
olaron behaviour.