18 research outputs found
Zeeman-limited Superconductivity in Crystalline Al Films
We report the evolution of the Zeeman-mediated superconducting phase diagram
(PD) in ultra-thin crystalline Al films. Parallel critical field measurements,
down to 50 mK, were made across the superconducting tricritical point of films
ranging in thickness from 7 ML to 30 ML. The resulting phase boundaries were
compared with the quasi-classical theory of a Zeeman-mediated transition
between a homogeneous BCS condensate and a spin polarized Fermi liquid. Films
thicker than 20 ML showed good agreement with theory, but thinner films
exhibited an anomalous PD that cannot be reconciled within a homogeneous BCS
framework.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figure
Interrogating the superconductor Ca10(Pt4As8)(Fe2-xPtxAs2)5 Layer-by-layer
Ever since the discovery of high-Tc superconductivity in layered cuprates,
the roles that individual layers play have been debated, due to difficulty in
layer-by-layer characterization. While there is similar challenge in many
Fe-based layered superconductors, the newly-discovered Ca10(Pt4As8)(Fe2As2)5
provides opportunities to explore superconductivity layer by layer, because it
contains both superconducting building blocks (Fe2As2 layers) and intermediate
Pt4As8 layers. Cleaving a single crystal under ultra-high vacuum results in
multiple terminations: an ordered Pt4As8 layer, two reconstructed Ca layers on
the top of a Pt4As8 layer, and disordered Ca layer on the top of Fe2As2 layer.
The electronic properties of individual layers are studied using scanning
tunneling microscopy/spectroscopy (STM/S), which reveals different spectra for
each surface. Remarkably superconducting coherence peaks are seen only on the
ordered Ca/Pt4As8 layer. Our results indicate that an ordered structure with
proper charge balance is required in order to preserve superconductivity
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Influence of Nanosize Hole Defects and their Geometric Arrangements on the Superfluid Density in Atomically Thin Single Crystals of Indium Superconductor
Using Indium √ √ on Si(111) as an atomically thin superconductor platform, and by
systematically controlling the density of nano-hole defects (nanometer size voids), we reveal
the impacts of defects density and defects geometric arrangements on superconductivity at
macroscopic and microscopic length scales. When nano-hole defects are uniformly dispersed
in the atomic layer, the superfluid density monotonically decreases as a function of defect
density (from 0.7% to 5% of the surface area) with minor change in the transition
temperature Tc, measured both microscopically and macroscopically. With a slight increase
in the defect density from 5% to 6%, these point defects are organized into defect chains that
enclose individual two-dimensional patches. This new geometric arrangement of defects
dramatically impacts the superconductivity, leading to the total disappearance of
macroscopic superfluid density and the collapse of the microscopic superconducting gap.
This study sheds new light on the understanding of how local defects and their geometric
arrangement impact superconductivity in the two-dimensional limit.This work was primarily supported by the National Science Foundation through the Center for
Dynamics and Control of Materials: an NSF MRSEC under Cooperative Agreement No. DMR-
1720595. Other support was from NSF Grant Nos. DMR-1808751, DMR-1949701, DMR-
2114825, and the Welch Foundation F-1672.Center for Dynamics and Control of Material
Epitaxial Growth of Two-dimensional Insulator Monolayer Honeycomb BeO
The emergence of two-dimensional (2D) materials launched a fascinating
frontier of flatland electronics. Most crystalline atomic layer materials are
based on layered van der Waals materials with weak interlayer bonding, which
naturally leads to thermodynamically stable monolayers. We report the synthesis
of a 2D insulator comprised of a single atomic sheet of honeycomb structure BeO
(h-BeO), although its bulk counterpart has a wurtzite structure. The h-BeO is
grown by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) on Ag(111) thin films that are
conveniently grown on Si(111) wafers. Using scanning tunneling microscopy and
spectroscopy (STM/S), the honeycomb BeO lattice constant is determined to be
2.65 angstrom with an insulating band gap of 6 eV. Our low energy electron
diffraction (LEED) measurements indicate that the h-BeO forms a continuous
layer with good crystallinity at the millimeter scale. Moir\'e pattern analysis
shows the BeO honeycomb structure maintains long range phase coherence in
atomic registry even across Ag steps. We find that the interaction between the
h-BeO layer and the Ag(111) substrate is weak by using STS and complimentary
density functional theory calculations. We not only demonstrate the feasibility
of growing h-BeO monolayers by MBE, but also illustrate that the large-scale
growth, weak substrate interactions, and long-range crystallinity make h-BeO an
attractive candidate for future technological applications. More significantly,
the ability to create a stable single crystalline atomic sheet without a bulk
layered counterpart is an intriguing approach to tailoring novel 2D electronic
materials.Comment: 25 pages, 7 figures, submitted to ACS Nano, equal contribution by Hui
Zhang and Madisen Holbroo
Geometric quenching of orbital pair breaking in a single crystalline superconducting nanomesh network
In a superconductor Cooper pairs condense into a single state and in so doing support dissipation free charge flow and perfect diamagnetism. In a magnetic field the minimum kinetic energy of the Cooper pairs increases, producing an orbital pair breaking effect. We show that it is possible to significantly quench the orbital pair breaking effect for both parallel and perpendicular magnetic fields in a thin film superconductor with lateral nanostructure on a length scale smaller than the magnetic length. By growing an ultra-thin (2 nm thick) single crystalline Pb nanowire network, we establish nm scale lateral structure without introducing weak links. Our network suppresses orbital pair breaking for both perpendicular and in-plane fields with a negligible reduction in zero-field resistive critical temperatures. Our study opens a frontier in nanoscale superconductivity by providing a strategy for maintaining pairing in strong field environments in all directions with important technological implications
Ultrathin two-dimensional superconductivity with strong spin-orbit coupling
We report on a study of epitaxially grown ultrathin Pb films that are only a few atoms thick and have parallel critical magnetic fields much higher than the expected limit set by the interaction of electron spins with a magnetic field, that is, the Clogston-Chandrasekhar limit. The epitaxial thin films are classified as dirty-limit superconductors because their mean-free paths, which are limited by surface scattering, are smaller than their superconducting coherence lengths. The uniformity of superconductivity in these thin films is established by comparing scanning tunneling spectroscopy, scanning superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID) magnetometry, double-coil mutual inductance, and magneto-transport, data that provide average superfluid rigidity on length scales covering the range from microscopic to macroscopic. We argue that the survival of superconductivity at Zeeman energies much larger than the superconducting gap can be understood only as the consequence of strong spin-orbit coupling that, together with substrate-induced inversionsymmetry breaking, produces spin splitting in the normal-state energy bands that is much larger than the superconductor\u27s energy gap
Visualizing landscapes of the superconducting gap in heterogeneous superconductor thin films: geometric influences on proximity effects
The proximity effect is a central feature of superconducting junctions as it
underlies many important applications in devices and can be exploited in the
design of new systems with novel quantum functionality. Recently, exotic
proximity effects have been observed in various systems, such as
superconductor-metallic nanowires and graphene-superconductor structures.
However, it is still not clear how superconducting order propagates spatially
in a heterogeneous superconductor system. Here we report intriguing influences
of junction geometry on the proximity effect for a 2D heterogeneous
superconductor system comprised of 2D superconducting islands on top of a
surface metal. Depending on the local geometry, the superconducting gap induced
in the surface metal region can either be confined to the boundary of the
superconductor, in which the gap decays within a short distance (~ 15 nm), or
can be observed nearly uniformly over a distance of many coherence lengths due
to non-local proximity effects.Comment: 17 pages, 4 figure
PTCDA molecular monolayer on Pb thin films: An unusual π-electron Kondo system and its interplay with a quantum-confined superconductor
The hybridization of magnetism and superconductivity has been an intriguing playground for correlated electron systems, hosting various novel physical phenomena. Usually, localized d- or f-electrons are central to magnetism. In this study, by placing a PTCDA (3,4,9,10-perylene tetracarboxylic dianhydride) molecular monolayer on ultra-thin Pb films, we built a hybrid magnetism/superconductivity (M/SC) system consisting of only sp electronic levels. The magnetic moments reside in the unpaired molecular orbital originating from interfacial charge-transfers. We reported distinctive tunneling spectroscopic features of such a Kondo screened pi-electron impurity lattice on a superconductor in the regime of TK>>delta suggesting the formation of a two-dimensional bound states band. Moreover, moiré superlattices with tunable twist angle and the quantum confinement in the ultra-thin Pb films provide easy and flexible implementations to tune the interplay between the Kondo physics and the superconductivity, which are rarely present in M/SC hybrid systems.Center for Dynamics and Control of Material