9,084 research outputs found
Observation of vortices and hidden pseudogap from scanning tunneling spectroscopic studies of electron-doped cuprate superconductor
We present the first demonstration of vortices in an electron-type cuprate
superconductor, the highest (= 43 K) electron-type cuprate
. Our spatially resolved quasiparticle tunneling spectra
reveal a hidden low-energy pseudogap inside the vortex core and unconventional
spectral evolution with temperature and magnetic field. These results cannot be
easily explained by the scenario of pure superconductivity in the ground state
of high- superconductivity.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures. Two new graphs have been added into Figure 2.
Accepted for publication in Europhysics Letters. Corresponding author:
Nai-Chang Yeh (E-mail: [email protected]
Robust and clean Majorana zero mode in the vortex core of high-temperature superconductor (Li0.84Fe0.16)OHFeSe
The Majorana fermion, which is its own anti-particle and obeys non-abelian
statistics, plays a critical role in topological quantum computing. It can be
realized as a bound state at zero energy, called a Majorana zero mode (MZM), in
the vortex core of a topological superconductor, or at the ends of a nanowire
when both superconductivity and strong spin orbital coupling are present. A MZM
can be detected as a zero-bias conductance peak (ZBCP) in tunneling
spectroscopy. However, in practice, clean and robust MZMs have not been
realized in the vortices of a superconductor, due to contamination from
impurity states or other closely-packed Caroli-de Gennes-Matricon (CdGM)
states, which hampers further manipulations of Majorana fermions. Here using
scanning tunneling spectroscopy, we show that a ZBCP well separated from the
other discrete CdGM states exists ubiquitously in the cores of free vortices in
the defect free regions of (Li0.84Fe0.16)OHFeSe, which has a superconducting
transition temperature of 42 K. Moreover, a Dirac-cone-type surface state is
observed by angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy, and its topological
nature is confirmed by band calculations. The observed ZBCP can be naturally
attributed to a MZM arising from this chiral topological surface states of a
bulk superconductor. (Li0.84Fe0.16)OHFeSe thus provides an ideal platform for
studying MZMs and topological quantum computing.Comment: 32 pages, 15 figures (supplementary materials included), accepted by
PR
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