Tunnelling spectroscopy of Andreev states in graphene
Abstract
A normal conductor placed in good contact with a superconductor can inherit its remarkable electronic properties. This proximity effect microscopically originates from the formation in the conductor of entangled electron–hole states, called Andreev states. Spectroscopic studies of Andreev states have been performed in just a handful of systems. The unique geometry, electronic structure and high mobility of graphene make it a novel platform for studying Andreev physics in two dimensions. In this paper, we use a full van der Waals heterostructure to perform tunnelling spectroscopy measurements of the proximity effect in superconductor–graphene–superconductor junctions. The measured energy spectra, which depend on the phase difference between the superconductors, reveal the presence of a continuum of Andreev bound states. Moreover, our device heterostructure geometry and materials enable us to measure the Andreev spectrum as a function of the graphene Fermi energy, showing a transition between different mesoscopic regimes. Furthermore, by experimentally introducing a novel concept, the supercurrent spectral density, we determine the supercurrent–phase relation in a tunnelling experiment, thus establishing the connection between Andreev physics at finite energy and the Josephson effect. Finally, this work opens up new avenues for probing exotic topological phases of matter in hybrid superconducting Dirac materials.
- Authors:
-
- Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States). Dept. of Physics
- National Inst. for Materials Science (NIMS), Tsukuba (Japan)
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); National Science Foundation (NSF); Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation (United States); Taiwan Merit Scholarship
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1473905
- Grant/Contract Number:
- SC0001819; DMR-0819762; ECS-0335765; GBMF4541; TMS-094-1-A-001
- Resource Type:
- Journal Article: Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Name:
- Nature Physics
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Volume: 13; Journal Issue: 8; Journal ID: ISSN 1745-2473
- Publisher:
- Nature Publishing Group (NPG)
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 36 MATERIALS SCIENCE; electronic properties and devices; electronic properties and materials; superconducting devices; superconducting properties and materials
Citation Formats
Bretheau, Landry, Wang, Joel I-Jan, Pisoni, Riccardo, Watanabe, Kenji, Taniguchi, Takashi, and Jarillo-Herrero, Pablo. Tunnelling spectroscopy of Andreev states in graphene. United States: N. p., 2017.
Web. doi:10.1038/NPHYS4110.
Bretheau, Landry, Wang, Joel I-Jan, Pisoni, Riccardo, Watanabe, Kenji, Taniguchi, Takashi, & Jarillo-Herrero, Pablo. Tunnelling spectroscopy of Andreev states in graphene. United States. https://doi.org/10.1038/NPHYS4110
Bretheau, Landry, Wang, Joel I-Jan, Pisoni, Riccardo, Watanabe, Kenji, Taniguchi, Takashi, and Jarillo-Herrero, Pablo. 2017.
"Tunnelling spectroscopy of Andreev states in graphene". United States. https://doi.org/10.1038/NPHYS4110. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1473905.
@article{osti_1473905,
title = {Tunnelling spectroscopy of Andreev states in graphene},
author = {Bretheau, Landry and Wang, Joel I-Jan and Pisoni, Riccardo and Watanabe, Kenji and Taniguchi, Takashi and Jarillo-Herrero, Pablo},
abstractNote = {A normal conductor placed in good contact with a superconductor can inherit its remarkable electronic properties. This proximity effect microscopically originates from the formation in the conductor of entangled electron–hole states, called Andreev states. Spectroscopic studies of Andreev states have been performed in just a handful of systems. The unique geometry, electronic structure and high mobility of graphene make it a novel platform for studying Andreev physics in two dimensions. In this paper, we use a full van der Waals heterostructure to perform tunnelling spectroscopy measurements of the proximity effect in superconductor–graphene–superconductor junctions. The measured energy spectra, which depend on the phase difference between the superconductors, reveal the presence of a continuum of Andreev bound states. Moreover, our device heterostructure geometry and materials enable us to measure the Andreev spectrum as a function of the graphene Fermi energy, showing a transition between different mesoscopic regimes. Furthermore, by experimentally introducing a novel concept, the supercurrent spectral density, we determine the supercurrent–phase relation in a tunnelling experiment, thus establishing the connection between Andreev physics at finite energy and the Josephson effect. Finally, this work opens up new avenues for probing exotic topological phases of matter in hybrid superconducting Dirac materials.},
doi = {10.1038/NPHYS4110},
url = {https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1473905},
journal = {Nature Physics},
issn = {1745-2473},
number = 8,
volume = 13,
place = {United States},
year = {Mon May 01 00:00:00 EDT 2017},
month = {Mon May 01 00:00:00 EDT 2017}
}
Web of Science
Works referenced in this record:
Exciting Andreev pairs in a superconducting atomic contact
journal, July 2013
- Bretheau, L.; Girit, Ç. Ö.; Pothier, H.
- Nature, Vol. 499, Issue 7458
Suppression of the Josephson current through a narrow, mesoscopic, semiconductor channel by a single impurity
journal, November 1992
- Bagwell, Philip F.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 46, Issue 19
Specular Andreev Reflection in Graphene
journal, August 2006
- Beenakker, C. W. J.
- Physical Review Letters, Vol. 97, Issue 6
Scanning tunnelling microscopy and spectroscopy of ultra-flat graphene on hexagonal boron nitride
journal, February 2011
- Xue, Jiamin; Sanchez-Yamagishi, Javier; Bulmash, Danny
- Nature Materials, Vol. 10, Issue 4
Ballistic Josephson junctions in edge-contacted graphene
journal, July 2015
- Calado, V. E.; Goswami, S.; Nanda, G.
- Nature Nanotechnology, Vol. 10, Issue 9
Density of states and the energy gap in Andreev billiards
journal, September 1998
- Lodder, A.; Nazarov, Yu. V.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 58, Issue 9
Andreev bound states in supercurrent-carrying carbon nanotubes revealed
journal, November 2010
- Pillet, J-D.; Quay, C. H. L.; Morfin, P.
- Nature Physics, Vol. 6, Issue 12
Transport through Andreev bound states in a graphene quantum dot
journal, February 2011
- Dirks, Travis; Hughes, Taylor L.; Lal, Siddhartha
- Nature Physics, Vol. 7, Issue 5
Josephson current through a superconducting quantum point contact shorter than the coherence length
journal, June 1991
- Beenakker, C. W. J.; van Houten, H.
- Physical Review Letters, Vol. 66, Issue 23
Supercurrent in the quantum Hall regime
journal, May 2016
- Amet, F.; Ke, C. T.; Borzenets, I. V.
- Science, Vol. 352, Issue 6288
Spatially resolved edge currents and guided-wave electronic states in graphene
journal, November 2015
- Allen, M. T.; Shtanko, O.; Fulga, I. C.
- Nature Physics, Vol. 12, Issue 2
Exotic non-Abelian anyons from conventional fractional quantum Hall states
journal, January 2013
- Clarke, David J.; Alicea, Jason; Shtengel, Kirill
- Nature Communications, Vol. 4, Issue 1
Boundary Effects in Superconductors
journal, January 1964
- De Gennes, P. G.
- Reviews of Modern Physics, Vol. 36, Issue 1
Josephson transport in complex mesoscopic structures
journal, December 1996
- Wendin, Göran; Shumeiko, Vitaly S.
- Superlattices and Microstructures, Vol. 20, Issue 4
Tunneling Spectroscopy of Quasiparticle Bound States in a Spinful Josephson Junction
journal, May 2013
- Chang, W.; Manucharyan, V. E.; Jespersen, T. S.
- Physical Review Letters, Vol. 110, Issue 21
Superconducting proximity effect in long superconductor/graphene/superconductor junctions: From specular Andreev reflection at zero field to the quantum Hall regime
journal, September 2012
- Komatsu, Katsuyoshi; Li, Chuan; Autier-Laurent, S.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 86, Issue 11
Dc Josephson effect and Andreev reflection
journal, April 1991
- Furusaki, Akira; Tsukada, Masaru
- Solid State Communications, Vol. 78, Issue 4
Possible new effects in superconductive tunnelling
journal, July 1962
- Josephson, B. D.
- Physics Letters, Vol. 1, Issue 7
Reversing the direction of the supercurrent in a controllable Josephson junction
journal, January 1999
- Baselmans, J. J. A.; Morpurgo, A. F.; van Wees, B. J.
- Nature, Vol. 397, Issue 6714
Electronic transport in two-dimensional graphene
journal, May 2011
- Das Sarma, S.; Adam, Shaffique; Hwang, E. H.
- Reviews of Modern Physics, Vol. 83, Issue 2, p. 407-470
Quantum oscillations of the critical current and high-field superconducting proximity in ballistic graphene
journal, December 2015
- Ben Shalom, M.; Zhu, M. J.; Fal’ko, V. I.
- Nature Physics, Vol. 12, Issue 4
Scanning tunneling spectroscopy of proximity superconductivity in epitaxial multilayer graphene
journal, January 2016
- Natterer, Fabian D.; Ha, Jeonghoon; Baek, Hongwoo
- Physical Review B, Vol. 93, Issue 4
Bipolar supercurrent in graphene
journal, March 2007
- Heersche, Hubert B.; Jarillo-Herrero, Pablo; Oostinga, Jeroen B.
- Nature, Vol. 446, Issue 7131
One-Dimensional Electrical Contact to a Two-Dimensional Material
journal, October 2013
- Wang, L.; Meric, I.; Huang, P. Y.
- Science, Vol. 342, Issue 6158
Josephson current and multiple Andreev reflections in graphene SNS junctions
journal, May 2008
- Du, Xu; Skachko, Ivan; Andrei, Eva Y.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 77, Issue 18
Tunable Graphene dc Superconducting Quantum Interference Device
journal, January 2009
- Girit, Çaǧlar; Bouchiat, V.; Naaman, O.
- Nano Letters, Vol. 9, Issue 1
Mesoscopic Superconducting–Normal Metal–Superconducting Transistor
journal, August 1998
- Wilhelm, Frank K.; Schön, Gerd; Zaikin, Andrei D.
- Physical Review Letters, Vol. 81, Issue 8
Direct Observation of the Transition from the Conventional Superconducting State to the State in a Controllable Josephson Junction
journal, October 2002
- Baselmans, J. J. A.; Heikkilä, T. T.; van Wees, B. J.
- Physical Review Letters, Vol. 89, Issue 20
The electronic properties of graphene
journal, January 2009
- Castro Neto, A. H.; Guinea, F.; Peres, N. M. R.
- Reviews of Modern Physics, Vol. 81, Issue 1, p. 109-162
Transmission formalism for supercurrent flow in multiprobe superconductor-semiconductor-superconductor devices
journal, July 1991
- van Wees, B. J.; Lenssen, K. -M. H.; Harmans, C. J. P. M.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 44, Issue 1
Electronic Transport of Encapsulated Graphene and WSe 2 Devices Fabricated by Pick-up of Prepatterned hBN
journal, February 2015
- Wang, Joel I-Jan; Yang, Yafang; Chen, Yu-An
- Nano Letters, Vol. 15, Issue 3
Observation of electron–hole puddles in graphene using a scanning single-electron transistor
journal, November 2007
- Martin, J.; Akerman, N.; Ulbricht, G.
- Nature Physics, Vol. 4, Issue 2
Specular interband Andreev reflections at van der Waals interfaces between graphene and NbSe2
journal, December 2015
- Efetov, D. K.; Wang, L.; Handschin, C.
- Nature Physics, Vol. 12, Issue 4
Nonequilibrium Josephson effect in mesoscopic ballistic multiterminal SNS junctions
journal, July 2000
- Samuelsson, P.; Lantz, J.; Shumeiko, V. S.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 62, Issue 2
Phase Controlled Superconducting Proximity Effect Probed by Tunneling Spectroscopy
journal, May 2008
- le Sueur, H.; Joyez, P.; Pothier, H.
- Physical Review Letters, Vol. 100, Issue 19
Isospin Pomeranchuk effect in twisted bilayer graphene
journal, April 2021
- Saito, Yu; Yang, Fangyuan; Ge, Jingyuan
- Nature, Vol. 592, Issue 7853
An Information Theory-Inspired Strategy for Design of Re-programmable Encrypted Graphene-based Coding Metasurfaces at Terahertz Frequencies
journal, April 2018
- Momeni, Ali; Rouhi, Kasra; Rajabalipanah, Hamid
- Scientific Reports, Vol. 8, Issue 1
Observation of Electron-Hole Puddles in Graphene Using a Scanning Single Electron Transistor
text, January 2007
- Martin, J.; Akerman, N.; Ulbricht, G.
- arXiv
The electronic properties of graphene
text, January 2007
- Neto, A. H. Castro; Guinea, F.; Peres, N. M. R.
- arXiv
Josephson Current and Multiple Andreev Reflections in Graphene SNS Junctions
text, January 2007
- Du, Xu; Skachko, Ivan; Andrei, Eva Y.
- arXiv
Phase controlled superconducting proximity effect probed by tunneling spectroscopy
text, January 2008
- Sueur, H. Le; Joyez, P.; Pothier, H.
- arXiv
Exciting Andreev pairs in a superconducting atomic contact
text, January 2013
- Bretheau, L.; Girit, Ç. Ö.; Pothier, Hugues
- arXiv
Ballistic Josephson junctions in edge-contacted graphene
text, January 2015
- Calado, Victor E.; Goswami, Srijit; Nanda, Gaurav
- arXiv
Quantum oscillations of the critical current and high-field superconducting proximity in ballistic graphene
text, January 2015
- Shalom, M. Ben; Zhu, M. J.; Fal'ko, V. I.
- arXiv
Spatially resolved edge currents and guided-wave electronic states in graphene
text, January 2015
- Allen, Monica T.; Shtanko, Oles; Fulga, Ion Cosma
- arXiv
Scanning Tunneling Spectroscopy of Proximity Superconductivity in Epitaxial Multilayer Graphene
text, January 2016
- Natterer, Fabian D.; Ha, Jeonghoon; Baek, Hongwoo
- arXiv
Density of States and Energy Gap in Andreev Billiards
text, January 1998
- Lodder, A.; Nazarov, Yu. V.
- arXiv
Nonequilibrium Josephson effect in mesoscopic ballistic multiterminal SNS junctions
text, January 1999
- Samuelsson, P.; Lantz, J.; Shumeiko, V. S.
- arXiv
Works referencing / citing this record:
Infrared-Sensitive Memory Based on Direct-Grown MoS 2 -Upconversion-Nanoparticle Heterostructure
journal, October 2018
- Zhai, Yongbiao; Yang, Xueqing; Wang, Feng
- Advanced Materials, Vol. 30, Issue 49
Unconventional superconductivity in magic-angle graphene superlattices
journal, March 2018
- Cao, Yuan; Fatemi, Valla; Fang, Shiang
- Nature, Vol. 556, Issue 7699
A ballistic graphene superconducting microwave circuit
journal, October 2018
- Schmidt, Felix E.; Jenkins, Mark D.; Watanabe, Kenji
- Nature Communications, Vol. 9, Issue 1
Coherent control of a hybrid superconducting circuit made with graphene-based van der Waals heterostructures
journal, December 2018
- Wang, Joel I-Jan; Rodan-Legrain, Daniel; Bretheau, Landry
- Nature Nanotechnology, Vol. 14, Issue 2
Topological superconductivity in a phase-controlled Josephson junction
journal, April 2019
- Ren, Hechen; Pientka, Falko; Hart, Sean
- Nature, Vol. 569, Issue 7754
1/f critical current noise in short ballistic graphene Josephson junctions
journal, January 2020
- Pellegrino, Francesco M. D.; Falci, Giuseppe; Paladino, Elisabetta
- Communications Physics, Vol. 3, Issue 1
Gate-tunable quantum dot in a high quality single layer MoS2 van der Waals heterostructure
journal, March 2018
- Pisoni, Riccardo; Lei, Zijin; Back, Patrick
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 112, Issue 12
Defects in h-BN tunnel barrier for local electrostatic probing of two dimensional materials
journal, September 2018
- Liu, Ying; Tan, Zhenbing; Kumar, Manohar
- APL Materials, Vol. 6, Issue 9
Probing the electronic structure of graphene near and far from the Fermi level via planar tunneling spectroscopy
journal, October 2019
- Davenport, John L.; Ge, Zhehao; Liu, Junyan
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 115, Issue 16
Proximity coupling in superconductor-graphene heterostructures
journal, March 2018
- Lee, Gil-Ho; Lee, Hu-Jong
- Reports on Progress in Physics, Vol. 81, Issue 5
Engineering the Floquet spectrum of superconducting multiterminal quantum dots
journal, July 2019
- Mélin, Régis; Danneau, Romain; Yang, Kang
- Physical Review B, Vol. 100, Issue 3
van der Waals tunneling devices
journal, August 2019
- Zalic, Ayelet; Simon, Shahar; Remennik, Sergei
- Physical Review B, Vol. 100, Issue 6
Andreev reflection in ballistic normal metal/graphene/superconductor junctions
journal, October 2019
- Pandey, P.; Kraft, R.; Krupke, R.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 100, Issue 16
Vortex-lattice structure and topological superconductivity in the quantum Hall regime
journal, January 2020
- Chaudhary, Gaurav; MacDonald, Allan H.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 101, Issue 2
Nonlocal Andreev entanglements and triplet correlations in graphene with spin-orbit coupling
journal, October 2017
- Beiranvand, Razieh; Hamzehpour, Hossein; Alidoust, Mohammad
- Physical Review B, Vol. 96, Issue 16
Nonequilibrium properties of graphene probed by superconducting tunnel spectroscopy
journal, February 2019
- Zihlmann, Simon; Makk, Péter; Castilla, Sebastián
- Physical Review B, Vol. 99, Issue 7
Fine energy splitting of overlapping Andreev bound states in multiterminal superconducting nanostructures
journal, October 2019
- Kornich, Viktoriia; Barakov, Hristo S.; Nazarov, Yuli V.
- Physical Review Research, Vol. 1, Issue 3
Local density of states in clean two-dimensional superconductor–normal metal–superconductor heterostructures
journal, October 2019
- Nikolić, D.; Belzig, W.; Cuevas, J. C.
- Physical Review Research, Vol. 1, Issue 3
Electrically tunable low-density superconductivity in a monolayer topological insulator
journal, October 2018
- Fatemi, Valla; Wu, Sanfeng; Cao, Yuan
- Science, Vol. 362, Issue 6417
Transport signatures of an Andreev molecule in a quantum dot–superconductor–quantum dot setup
journal, January 2019
- Scherübl, Zoltán; Pályi, András; Csonka, Szabolcs
- Beilstein Journal of Nanotechnology, Vol. 10
Nonequilibrium properties of graphene probed by superconducting tunnel spectroscopy
text, January 2019
- Zihlmann, S.; Makk, P.; Castilla, S.
- Apollo - University of Cambridge Repository
Interactions and Magnetotransport through Spin-Valley Coupled Landau Levels in Monolayer
text, January 2018
- Pisoni, Riccardo; Kormányos, Andor; Brooks, Matthew
- ETH Zurich
Engineering the Floquet spectrum of superconducting multiterminal quantum dots
text, January 2019
- Mélin, Régis; Danneau, Romain; Yang, Kang
- American Physical Society (APS)
Gate-Tunable Quantum Dot in a High Quality Single Layer MoS$_{\mathrm{2}}$ Van der Waals Heterostructure
text, January 2018
- Pisoni, Riccardo; Lei, Zijin; Back, Patrick
- arXiv
Defects in h-BN tunnel barrier for local electrostatic probing of two dimensional materials
preprint, January 2018
- Liu, Ying; Tan, Zhenbing; Kumar, Manohar
- arXiv
Transport signatures of an Andreev molecule in a quantum dot -- superconductor -- quantum dot setup
text, January 2018
- Scherübl, Zoltán; Pályi, András; Csonka, Szabolcs
- arXiv
Engineering the Floquet spectrum of superconducting multiterminal quantum dots
text, January 2019
- Mélin, Régis; Danneau, Romain; Yang, Kang
- arXiv
Andreev reflection in ballistic normal metal/graphene/superconductor junctions
text, January 2019
- Pandey, P.; Kraft, R.; Krupke, R.
- arXiv
1/f critical current noise in short ballistic graphene Josephson junctions
text, January 2019
- Pellegrino, Francesco M. D.; Falci, Giuseppe; Paladino, Elisabetta
- arXiv