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Register a new userClassification of Two Dimensional Topological Crystalline Superconductors and Majorana Bound States at Disclinations
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Added by
Wladimir A. Benalcazar
Publication date
2013
fields
Physics
and research's language is
English
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We classify discrete-rotation symmetric topological crystalline superconductors (TCS) in two dimensions and provide the criteria for a zero energy Majorana bound state (MBS) to be present at composite defects made from magnetic flux, dislocations, and disclinations. In addition to the Chern number that encodes chirality, discrete rotation symmetry further divides TCS into distinct stable topological classes according to the rotation eigenspectrum of Bogoliubov-de Gennes quasi-particles. Conical crystalline defects are shown to be able to accommodate robust MBS when a certain combination of these bulk topological invariants is non-trivial as dictated by the index theorems proved within. The number parity of MBS is counted by a $mathbb{Z}_2$-valued index that solely depends on the disclination and the topological class of the TCS. We also discuss the implications for corner-bound Majorana modes on the boundary of topological crystalline superconductors.
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We study quasiparticle states on a surface of a topological insulator (TI) with proximity-induced superconductivity under an external magnetic field. An applied magnetic field creates two Majorana bound states: a vortex Majorana state localized inside a vortex core and an exterior Majorana state localized along a circle centered at the vortex core. We calculate the spin-resolved local density of states (LDOS) and demonstrate that the shrinking of the radius of the exterior Majorana state, predicted in Ref. [R. S. Akzyanov et al., Phys. Rev. B 94, 125428 (2016)], under a strong magnetic field can be seen in LDOS without smeared out by non-zero-energy states. The spin-resolved LDOS further reveals that the spin of the exterior Majorana state is strongly polarized. Accordingly, the induced odd-frequency spin-triplet pairs are found to be spin-polarized as well. In order to detect the exterior Majorana states, however, the Fermi energy should be closed to the Dirac point to avoid contributions from continuum levels. We also study a different two-dimensional topological-superconducting system where a two-dimensional electron gas with the spin-orbit coupling is sandwiched between an s-wave superconductor and a ferromagnetic insulator. We show that the radius of an exterior Majorana state can be tuned by an applied magnetic field. However, on the contrary to the results at a TI surface, neither the exterior Majorana state nor the induced odd-frequency spin-triplet pairs are spin-polarized. We conclude that the spin-polarization of the Majorana state is attributed to the spin-polarized Landau level which is characteristic for systems with the Dirac-like dispersion.
We investigate one-dimensional (1D) Majorana bound states (MBSs) realized in terms of the helical edge states of a 2D quantum spin-Hall insulator (QSHI) in a heterostructure with a superconducting substrate and two ferromagnetic insulators (FIs). By means of Bogoliubov-de Gennes approach we demonstrate that there is a helical spin texture in the MBS wave function with a pitch proportional to the Fermi momentum of the helical edge states of QSHI. Moreover, simultaneous detection on local density of states by scanning tunneling microscopy and spectroscopy at a position close to one FI edge and at the midpoint between two FIs can not only map out the energy spectrum $pm E cos(phi/2)$, but also prove experimentally that the two quasiparticle excitations do not mix with each other as protected by the parity conservation associated with the MBSs.
Majorana fermions exist on the boundaries of two-dimensional topological superconductors (TSCs) as charge-neutral quasi-particles. The neutrality makes the detection of such states challenging from both experimental and theoretical points of view. Current methods largely rely on transport measurements in which Majorana fermions manifest themselves by inducing electron-pair tunneling at the lead-contacting point. Here we show that chiral Majorana fermions in TSCs generate {enhanced} local optical response. The features of local optical conductivity distinguish them not only from trivial superconductors or insulators but also from normal fermion edge states such as those in quantum Hall systems. Our results provide a new applicable method to detect dispersive Majorana fermions and may lead to a novel direction of this research field.
Collective modes in two dimensional topological superconductors are studied by an extended random phase approximation theory while considering the influence of vector field of light. In two situations, the s-wave superconductors without spin-orbit-coupling (SOC), and the hybrid semiconductor and s-wave superconductor layers with strong SOC, we get the analytical results for longitudinal modes which are found to be indeed gapless. Further more, the effective modes volumes can be calculated, the electric and magnetic fields can be expressed as the creation and annihilation operators of such modes. So, one can study the interaction of them with other quasi-particles through fields.
The possibility to observe and manipulate Majorana fermions as end states of one-dimensional topological superconductors has been actively discussed recently. In a quantum wire with strong spin-orbit coupling placed in proximity to a bulk superconductor, a topological superconductor has been expected to be realized when the band energy is split by the application of a magnetic field. When a periodic lattice modulation is applied multiple topological superconductor phases appear in the phase diagram. Some of them occur for higher filling factors compared to the case without the modulation. We study the effects of phase jumps and argue that the topologically nontrivial state of the whole system is retained even if they are present. We also study the effect of the spatial modulation in the hopping parameter.
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