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Josephson Supercurrent through the Topological Surface States of Strained Bulk HgTe

Please always quote using this URN: urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-129834
  • Strained bulk HgTe is a three-dimensional topological insulator, whose surface electrons have a high mobility (~ 30 000 cm\(^2\)=Vs), while its bulk is effectively free of mobile charge carriers. These properties enable a study of transport through its unconventional surface states without being hindered by a parallel bulk conductance. Here, we show transport experiments on HgTe-based Josephson junctions to investigate the appearance of the predicted Majorana states at the interface between a topological insulator and a superconductor.Strained bulk HgTe is a three-dimensional topological insulator, whose surface electrons have a high mobility (~ 30 000 cm\(^2\)=Vs), while its bulk is effectively free of mobile charge carriers. These properties enable a study of transport through its unconventional surface states without being hindered by a parallel bulk conductance. Here, we show transport experiments on HgTe-based Josephson junctions to investigate the appearance of the predicted Majorana states at the interface between a topological insulator and a superconductor. Interestingly, we observe a dissipationless supercurrent flow through the topological surface states of HgTe. The current-voltage characteristics are hysteretic at temperatures below 1 K, with critical supercurrents of several microamperes. Moreover, we observe a magnetic-field-induced Fraunhofer pattern of the critical supercurrent, indicating a dominant \(2\pi\)-periodic Josephson effect in the unconventional surface states. Our results show that strained bulk HgTe is a promising material system to get a better understanding of the Josephson effect in topological surface states, and to search for the manifestation of zero-energy Majorana states in transport experiments.show moreshow less

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Metadaten
Author: Jeroen B. Oostinga, Luis Maier, Peter Schüffelgen, Daniel Knott, Christopher Ames, Christoph Brüne, Grigory Tkachov, Hartmut Buhmann, Laurens W. Molenkamp
URN:urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-129834
Document Type:Journal article
Faculties:Fakultät für Physik und Astronomie / Physikalisches Institut
Language:English
Parent Title (English):Physical Review X
Year of Completion:2013
Volume:3
Issue:021007
Source:Physical Review X 3, 021007 (2013)
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevX.3.021007
Dewey Decimal Classification:5 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik / 53 Physik / 530 Physik
Tag:mesoscopics; superconductivity; topological insulators
Release Date:2016/07/01
EU-Project number / Contract (GA) number:267436
OpenAIRE:OpenAIRE
Licence (German):License LogoCC BY: Creative-Commons-Lizenz: Namensnennung