Quasiparticle Bound States around Fractional Vortices in s-wave Superconductor

Abstract

Since the experimental formation of a vortex with a fractional quantized magnetic flux in a thin superconducting $s$-wave bi-layer was recently reported, we calculate the local density of states (LDOS) around two half quantum vortices in a $s$-wave superconductor on the basis of the quasiclassical Eilenberger theory to investigate the effect of the phase discontinuity. We show that the LDOS pattern around fractional vortices is qualitatively different from that around conventional vortex. We find that the novel bow-tie-shaped bound states appear in the high energy region, which can be an evidence for the fractional vortices through scanning tunneling microscopy/spectroscopy. We also show that the system with $n$ fractional vortices with the vorticity $1/n$ has a similarity to the Josephson junctions.

8 pages, 15 figures

References in corpus (10)

• Observation of half-height magnetization steps in Sr2RuO4
• Observation of half-quantum vortices in topological superfluid 3He
• Magnetic response of mesoscopic superconducting rings with two order parameters
• Direct visualization of the nematic superconductivity in Cu${}_x$Bi${}_2$Se${}_3$
• Two-dimensional vortex behavior in highly underdoped YBa_2Cu_3O_{6+x} observed by scanning Hall probe microscopy
• Ground state, collective mode, phase soliton and vortex in multiband superconductors
• Analytical Formulation of the Local Density of States around a Vortex Core in Unconventional Superconductors
• Stability of half quantum vortex in rotating superfluid 3He-A between parallel plates
• Field-angle-dependent low-energy excitations around a vortex in the superconducting topological insulator CuxBi2Se3
• Visualizing the $d$-vector in a nematic triplet superconductor

Cited by in corpus (2)

• Vortex supercurrent inversion by frequency-symmetry conversion of Cooper pairs
• Fractional skyrmion and absence of low-lying Andreev bound states in a micro fractional-flux quantum vortex