The conjecture made recently by the group at Sherbrooke, that their observed anomalous thermal Hall effect in the pseudogap phase in the cuprates is due to phonons, is supported on the basis of an earlier result that the observed loop-current order in this phase must induce lattice distortions which are linear in the order parameter and an applied magnetic field. The lowered symmetry of the crystal depends on the direction of the field. A consequence is that the elastic constants change proportional to the field and are shown to induce axial thermal transport with the same symmetries as the Lorentz force enforces for the normal electronic Hall effect. Direct measurements of elastic constants in a magnetic field are suggested to verify the quantitative aspects of the results.

• Received 26 March 2020
• Accepted 27 July 2020

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.102.075113