Microscopic out-of-equilibrium analysis of the zero-bias conductance peak in a one-dimensional topological superconductor
- Department of Physics, University of Cincinnati, OH 45221-0011 (United States)
Recently there has been a lot of excitement generated by the possibility of realizing and detecting Majorana fermions within the arena of condensed matter physics and its potential implication for topological quantum computing. In the pursuit of identifying and understanding the signatures of Majorana fermions in realistic systems, we go beyond the low-energy effective-model descriptions of Majorana bound states to derive non-equilibrium transport properties of a topological superconducting wire in the presence of arbitrarily large applied voltages. By virtue of a microscopic calculation we are able to model the tunnel coupling between the superconducting wire and the metallic leads realistically, study the role of high-energy non-topological excitations, predict how the behavior compares for an increasing number of odd versus even number of sites, and study the evolution across the topological quantum phase transition. We consider the Kitaev model as well as its specific realization in terms of a semiconductor-superconductor hybrid structures. Our results have concrete implications for the experimental search and study of Majorana fermions. Here I provide a brief selected summary of the talk presented during the fourth conference on Nuclei and Mesoscopic Physics (NMP14) which took place during May 5th-9th, 2014 at the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory (NSCL), on the campus of Michigan State University, in East Lansing, Michigan.
- OSTI ID:
- 22307984
- Journal Information:
- AIP Conference Proceedings, Vol. 1619, Issue 1; Conference: 4. conference on nuclei and mesoscopic physics 2014, East Lansing, MI (United States), 5-9 May 2014; Other Information: (c) 2014 AIP Publishing LLC; Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 0094-243X
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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