Some Correlations Between the Thermodynamic and Transport Properties of High T Oxides in the Normal State

Abstract
We review some of the systematic patterns in the normal state properties of high temperature oxide superconductors which may help in the search for the pairing mechanism. A recent analysis of thermodynamic properties, namely the conduction electron entropy determined from high resolution specific heat data and the static magnetic susceptibility, both measured for a wide range of closely spaced compositions, yields much information about the effects of hole doping and zinc substitution on the low energy electronic excitations in these compounds. We attempt to correlate this information with the systematic changes observed in the electrical resistivity, Hall coefficient and most notably the thermoelectric power, for which a new scaling property is reported.