Electronic structure of La2-xSrxNiO4 studied by photoemission and inverse-photoemission spectroscopy

The electronic structure of La2-xSrxNiO4 is studied by use of photoemission spectroscopy, bremsstrahlung-isochromat spectroscopy (BIS), and electron-energy-loss spectroscopy. Quantitative analyses are made on the valence-band and Ni 2p core-level photoemission spectra through configuration-interaction calculations on a NiO6 cluster model. On the basis of these analyses, it is concluded that La2NiO4 is a charge-transfer (CT) insulator and the magnitude of the band gap is about 4 eV, nearly the same as that of NiO. The BIS spectra show that unoccupied states induced by hole doping are spread over the CT gap, which is incompatible with a rigid-band picture for the hole doping. We discuss the origin of the different insulator-to-metal transition behavior between this system and La2-xSrxCuO4.