No Arabic abstract
We present a theory of phonon-mediated superconductivity in near magic angle twisted bilayer graphene. Using a microscopic model for phonon coupling to moire band electrons, we find that phonons generate attractive interactions in both $s$ and $d$ wave pairing channels and that the attraction is strong enough to explain the experimental superconducting transition temperatures. Before including Coulomb repulsion, the $s$-wave channel is more favorable; however, on-site Coulomb repulsion can suppress $s$-wave pairing relative to $d$-wave. The pair amplitude varies spatially with the moire period, and is identical in the two layers in the $s$-wave channel but phase shifted by $pi$ in the $d$-wave channel. We discuss experiments that can distinguish the two pairing states.
Motivated by the observation of two distinct superconducting phases in the moireless ABC-stacked rhombohedral trilayer graphene, we investigate the electron-acoustic-phonon coupling as a possible pairing mechanism. We predict the existence of superconductivity with the highest $T_csim 3$K near the Van Hove singularity. Away from the Van Hove singularity, $T_c$ remains finite in a wide range of doping. In our model, the $s$-wave spin-singlet and $f$-wave spin-triplet pairings yield the same $T_c$, while other pairing states have negligible $T_c$. Our theory provides a simple explanation for the two distinct superconducting phases in the experiment and suggests that superconductivity and other interaction-driven phases (e.g., ferromagnetism) can have different origins.
We show that introducing spin-singlet or spin-triplet superconductivity into twisted bilayer graphene induces higher-order topological superconductivity. $C_{2z}T$-protected corner states of Majorana Kramers pairs appear at the boundary between domains with opposite signs of pairing, and zero modes materialize in Abrikosov vortices. The topology of the superconducting phase originates from the anomaly [1] -- the absence of a lattice support -- of the single-valley band structure of twisted bilayer graphene, which is protected by $C_{2z}T$ and the particle-hole symmetry $cal P$. We prove that any pairing (spin-singlet or spin-triplet) term preserving valley-U(1), spin-SU(2), time-reversal, $C_{2z}T$, and $cal P$ must drive the system into a higher-order topological superconductor phase. Here spin-SU(2) is the global spin-SU(2) for the singlet pairing and a combination of two SU(2)s in the two valleys for the triplet pairing. Using a Dirac Hamiltonian, we demonstrate the existence of corner modes and confirm this with numerical calculations. These corner states are stable even if the approximate particle-hole symmetry $cal P$ is weakly broken, which is true in experimental setups. Finally, we suggest an experiment to detect the topological superconductivity: by observing the fractional Josephson effect in a TBG-TSC Josephson system.
I present results from an extended Migdal-Eliashberg theory of electron-phonon interactions and superconductivity. The history of the electron-phonon problem is introduced, and then study of the intermediate parameter regime is justified from the energy scales in the cuprate superconductors. The Holstein model is detailed, and limiting cases are examined to demonstrate the need for an extended theory of superconductivity. Results of the extended approximation are shown, including spectral functions and phase diagrams. These are discussed with reference to Hohenbergs theorem, the Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer theory and Coulomb repulsion.
We introduce and analyze a model that sheds light on the interplay between correlated insulating states, superconductivity, and flavor-symmetry breaking in magic angle twisted bilayer graphene. Using a variational mean-field theory, we determine the normal-state phase diagram of our model as a function of the band filling. The model features robust insulators at even integer fillings, occasional weaker insulators at odd integer fillings, and a pattern of flavor-symmetry breaking at non-integer fillings. Adding a phonon-mediated inter-valley retarded attractive interaction, we obtain strong-coupling superconducting domes, whose structure is in qualitative agreement with experiments. Our model elucidates how the intricate form of the interactions and the particle-hole asymmetry of the electronic structure determine the phase diagram. It also explains how subtle differences between devices may lead to the different behaviors observed experimentally. A similar model can be applied with minor modifications to other moir{e} systems, such as twisted trilayer graphene.
Identifying the microscopic mechanism for superconductivity in magic-angle twisted bilayer graphene (MATBG) is an outstanding open problem. While MATBG exhibits a rich phase-diagram, driven partly by the strong interactions relative to the electronic bandwidth, its single-particle properties are unique and likely play an important role in some of the phenomenological complexity. Some of the salient features include an electronic bandwidth smaller than the characteristic phonon bandwidth and a non-trivial structure of the underlying Bloch wavefunctions. We perform a theoretical study of the cooperative effects due to phonons and plasmons on pairing in order to disentangle the distinct role played by these modes on superconductivity. We consider a variant of MATBG with an enlarged number of fermion flavors, $N gg 1$, where the study of pairing instabilities reduces to the conventional (weak-coupling) Eliashberg framework. In particular, we show that certain umklapp processes involving mini-optical phonon modes, which arise physically as a result of the folding of the original acoustic branch of graphene due to the moire superlattice structure, contribute significantly towards enhancing pairing. We also investigate the role played by the dynamics of the screened Coulomb interaction on pairing, which leads to an enhancement in a narrow window of fillings, and study the effect of external screening due to a metallic gate on superconductivity. At strong coupling the dynamical pairing interaction leaves a spectral mark in the single particle tunneling density of states. We thus predict such features will appear at specific frequencies of the umklapp phonons corresponding to the sound velocity of graphene times an integer multiple of the Brillouin zone size.