Abstract
A new aspect of the charge dynamics in layered metallic cuprates has been discovered in the study of the in-plane Hall coefficient (RH) in La2-xSrxCuOx over a wide temeprature (4-500 K) and composition (0<x<0.35) range. The strongly temperature dependent RH, a hallmark of cuprate superconductors, is found to be the low temperature part of a simple functional form f(T/T*) which becomes constant for T>T*. This form, followed for x0.15, has a characteristic temperature T* which is high at the optimal composition (x=0.15) and decreases with increasing Sr concentration, similar to a temperature scale deduced from magnetic susceptibility. © 1994 The American Physical Society.