No Arabic abstract
WTe2, as a type-II Weyl semimetal, has 2D Fermi arcs on the (001) surface in the bulk and 1D helical edge states in its monolayer. These features have recently attracted wide attention in condensed matter physics. However, in the intermediate regime between the bulk and monolayer, the edge states have not been resolved owing to its closed band gap which makes the bulk states dominant. Here, we report the signatures of the edge superconductivity by superconducting quantum interference measurements in multilayer WTe2 Josephson junctions and we directly map the localized supercurrent. In thick WTe2 (~60 nm), the supercurrent is uniformly distributed by bulk states with symmetric Josephson effect ($left|I_c^+(B)right|=left|I_c^-(B)right|$). In thin WTe2 (10 nm), however, the supercurrent becomes confined to the edge and its width reaches up to 1.4 um and exhibits non-symmetric behavior $left|I_c^+(B)right| eq left|I_c^-(B)right|$. The ability to tune the edge domination by changing thickness and the edge superconductivity establishes WTe2 as a promising topological system with exotic quantum phases and a rich physics.
We calculate the beating of $h/2e$ and $h/e$ periodic oscillations of the flux-dependent critical supercurrent $I_c(Phi)$ through a quantum spin-Hall insulator between two superconducting electrodes. A conducting pathway along the superconductor connects the helical edge channels via a non-helical channel, allowing an electron incident on the superconductor along one edge to be Andreev reflected along the opposite edge. In the limit of small Andreev reflection probability the resulting even-odd effect is described by $I_cpropto|cos(ePhi/hbar)+f|$, with $|f|ll 1$ proportional to the probability for phase-coherent inter-edge transmission. Because the sign of $f$ depends on microscopic details, a sample-dependent inversion of the alternation of large and small peaks is a distinctive feature of the beating mechanism for the even-odd effect.
We show that some of the Josephson couplings of junctions arranged to form an inhomogeneous network undergo a non-perturbative renormalization provided that the networks connectivity is pertinently chosen. As a result, the zero-voltage Josephson critical currents $I_c$ turn out to be enhanced along directions selected by the networks topology. This renormalization effect is possible only on graphs whose adjacency matrix admits an hidden spectrum (i.e. a set of localized states disappearing in the thermodynamic limit). We provide a theoretical and experimental study of this effect by comparing the superconducting behavior of a comb-shaped Josephson junction network and a linear chain made with the same junctions: we show that the Josephson critical currents of the junctions located on the combs backbone are bigger than the ones of the junctions located on the chain. Our theoretical analysis, based on a discrete version of the Bogoliubov-de Gennes equation, leads to results which are in good quantitative agreement with experimental results.
We study quantum phase-slip (QPS) processes in a superconducting ring containing N Josephson junctions and threaded by an external static magnetic flux. In a such system, a QPS consists of a quantum tunneling event connecting two distinct classical states of the phases with different persistent currents [K. A. Matveev et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 89, 096802 (2002)]. When the Josephson coupling energy EJ of the junctions is larger than the charging energy EC = e2/2C where C is the junction capacitance, the quantum amplitude for the QPS process is exponentially small in the ratio EJ/EC. At given magnetic flux each QPS can be described as the tunneling of the phase difference of a single junction of almost 2pi, accompanied by a small harmonic displacement of the phase difference of the other N-1 junctions. As a consequence the total QPS amplitude nu is a global property of the ring. Here we study the dependence of nu on the ring size N taking into account the effect of a finite capacitance C0 to ground which leads to the appearance of low-frequency dispersive modes. Josephson and charging effects compete and lead to a nonmonotonic dependence of the ring critical current on N. For N=infty, the system converges either towards a superconducting or an insulating state, depending on the ratio between the charging energy E0 = e2/2C0 and the Josephson coupling energy EJ.
Despite the robustness of the chiral edge modes of quantum Hall systems against the superconducting proximity effect, Cooper pairs can penetrate into the chiral edge channels and carry the Josephson current in an appropriate setup. In our work, the Josephson junction of a spin-polarized quantum anomalous Hall insulator (QAHI) with a Chern number $ u=1$ connecting conventional superconductors is studied from the perspective of pairing symmetry consistent with the chiral edge mode. Induced pairing states are equal-spin triplet, a combination of the even- and odd-frequency components, nonlocally extended, and have a finite momentum $2k_F$. The signature of the equal-spin triplet pairings is confirmed via the dependence on the interface-magnetization direction, and that of the finite-momentum pairing states via the spatial profile of the anomalous Greens function. In the presence of disorder, the robustness of the chiral edge mode leads to high sensitivity of the critical current and the equilibrium phase difference to disorder configurations, which is resulting from the interference of current-carrying channels. The numerical calculations on a lattice model are also examined by a simplified analytical model.
The Josephson current in a diffusive superconductor/ferromagnet/superconductor junction with precessing magnetization is calculated within the quasiclassical theory of superconductivity. When the junction is phase-biased, a stationary current (without a.c. component) can flow through it despite the non-equilibrium condition. A large critical current is predicted due to a dynamically induced long range triplet proximity effect. Such effect could be observed in a conventional hybrid device close to the ferromagnetic resonance.