• Open Access

Supercurrent-enabled Andreev reflection in a chiral quantum Hall edge state

Andreas Bock Michelsen, Patrik Recher, Bernd Braunecker, and Thomas L. Schmidt
Phys. Rev. Research 5, 013066 – Published 31 January 2023

Abstract

A chiral quantum Hall (QH) edge state placed in proximity to an s-wave superconductor experiences induced superconducting correlations. Recent experiments have observed the effect of proximity coupling in QH edge states through signatures of the mediating process of Andreev reflection. We present the microscopic theory behind this effect by modeling the system with a many-body Hamiltonian, consisting of an s-wave superconductor, subject to spin-orbit coupling and a magnetic field, which is coupled by electron tunneling to an integer QH edge state. By integrating out the superconductor we obtain an effective pairing Hamiltonian in the QH edge state. We clarify the qualitative appearance of nonlocal superconducting correlations in a chiral edge state and analytically predict the suppression of electron-hole conversion at low energies (Pauli blocking) and negative resistance as experimental signatures of Andreev reflection in this setup. In particular, we show how two surface phenomena of the superconductor, namely, Rashba spin-orbit coupling and a supercurrent due to the Meissner effect, are essential for the Andreev reflection. Our work provides a promising pathway to the realization of Majorana zero modes and their parafermionic generalizations.

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  • Received 30 March 2022
  • Revised 26 September 2022
  • Accepted 20 December 2022

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevResearch.5.013066

Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

Published by the American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Condensed Matter, Materials & Applied Physics

Authors & Affiliations

Andreas Bock Michelsen1,2, Patrik Recher3,4, Bernd Braunecker1, and Thomas L. Schmidt2

  • 1SUPA, School of Physics and Astronomy, University of St. Andrews, North Haugh, St. Andrews KY16 9SS, United Kingdom
  • 2Department of Physics and Materials Science, University of Luxembourg, L-1511 Luxembourg, Luxembourg
  • 3Institut für Mathematische Physik, Technische Universität Braunschweig, 38106 Braunschweig, Germany
  • 4Laboratory for Emerging Nanometrology, 38106 Braunschweig, Germany

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Vol. 5, Iss. 1 — January - March 2023

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