Physical mechanisms for zero-bias conductance peaks in Majorana nanowires

Abstract

Motivated by the need to understand and simulate the ubiquitous experimentally-observed zero-bias conductance peaks in superconductor-semiconductor hybrid structures, we theoretically investigate the tunneling conductance spectra in one-dimensional nanowires in proximity to superconductors in a systematic manner taking into account several different physical mechanisms producing zero-bias conductance peaks. The mechanisms we consider are the presence of quantum dots, inhomogeneous potential, random disorder in the chemical potential, random fluctuations in the superconducting gap, and in the effective $g$ factor with the self-energy renormalization induced by the parent superconductor in both short ($L\sim 1\mu$m) and long nanowires ($L\sim 3\mu$m). We classify all foregoing theoretical results for zero-bias conductance peaks into three types: the good, the bad, and the ugly, according to the physical mechanisms producing the zero-bias peaks and their topological properties. We find that, although the topological Majorana zero modes are immune to weak disorder, strong disorder (ugly) completely suppresses topological superconductivity and generically leads to trivial zero bias peaks. Compared qualitatively with the extensive existing experimental results in the superconductor-semiconductor nanowire structures, we conclude that most current experiments are likely exploring trivial zero-bias peaks in the ugly situation dominated by strong disorder. We also study the nonlocal end-to-end correlation measurement in both the short and long wires, and point out the limitation of the nonlocal correlation in ascertaining topological properties particularly when applied to short wires. The goal of the work is to establish with a very high confidence level the real physical possibility that essentially all experimentally observed zero bias peaks in Majorana nanowires are most likely ugly.

arXiv comment35 pages, 30 figures

References in corpus (108)

• Non-Abelian Anyons and Topological Quantum Computation
• Superconducting proximity effect and Majorana fermions at the surface of a topological insulator
• Unpaired Majorana fermions in quantum wires
• Signatures of Majorana fermions in hybrid superconductor-semiconductor nanowire devices
• Majorana Fermions and a Topological Phase Transition in Semiconductor-Superconductor Heterostructures
• Helical liquids and Majorana bound states in quantum wires
• New directions in the pursuit of Majorana fermions in solid state systems
• Random-Matrix Theory of Quantum Transport
• Novel Symmetry Classes in Mesoscopic Normal-Superconducting Hybrid Structures
• Random Matrix Theories in Quantum Physics: Common Concepts
• Evidence of Majorana fermions in an Al - InAs nanowire topological superconductor
• A generic new platform for topological quantum computation using semiconductor heterostructures
• Search for Majorana fermions in superconductors
• Observation of Majorana Fermions in a Nb-InSb Nanowire-Nb Hybrid Quantum Device
• Topological superconductors: a review
• Kwant: a software package for quantum transport
• Majorana Zero Modes and Topological Quantum Computation
• Exponential Protection of Zero Modes in Majorana Islands
• Majorana bound states in a coupled quantum-dot hybrid-nanowire system
• Realizing Majorana zero modes in superconductor-semiconductor heterostructures
• Colloquium: Majorana Fermions in nuclear, particle and solid-state physics
• Introduction to topological superconductivity and Majorana fermions
• Superconductor-Nanowire Devices from Tunneling to the Multichannel Regime: Zero-Bias Oscillations and Magnetoconductance Crossover
• Anomalous modulation of a zero bias peak in a hybrid nanowire-superconductor device
• Scalable Designs for Quasiparticle-Poisoning-Protected Topological Quantum Computation with Majorana Zero Modes
• Electrically detected interferometry of Majorana fermions in a topological insulator
• Quantized Majorana conductance
• Epitaxy of Semiconductor-Superconductor nanowires
• Non-Abelian quantum order in spin-orbit-coupled semiconductors: The search for topological Majorana particles in solid state systems
• Zero-bias peaks in spin-orbit coupled superconducting wires with and without Majorana end-states
• Majorana Fermions in Semiconductor Nanowires: Fundamentals, Modeling, and Experiment
• Scaling of Majorana Zero-Bias Conductance Peaks
• Andreev bound states versus Majorana bound states in quantum dot-nanowire-superconductor hybrid structures: Trivial versus topological zero-bias conductance peaks
• Hard gap in epitaxial semiconductor-superconductor nanowires
• Majorana Fermions in Semiconductor Nanowires
• Near-zero-energy end states in topologically trivial spin-orbit coupled superconducting nanowires with a smooth confinement
• Transport spectroscopy of NS nanowire junctions with Majorana fermions
• Majorana Fermions and Topology in Superconductors
• Towards a realistic transport modeling in a superconducting nanowire with Majorana fermions
• Zero-bias anomaly in a nanowire quantum dot coupled to superconductors
• Ballistic Majorana nanowire devices
• A Majorana smoking gun for the superconductor-semiconductor hybrid topological system
• Zero-voltage conductance peak from weak antilocalization in a Majorana nanowire
• Proposal to stabilize and detect half-quantum vortices in strontium ruthenate thin films: Non-Abelian braiding statistics of vortex matter in a $p_x+i{p}_y$ superconductor
• Class D spectral peak in Majorana quantum wires
• Majorana box qubits
• Search for Majorana fermions in multiband semiconducting nanowires
• Reproducing topological properties with quasi-Majorana states
• Ballistic superconductivity in semiconductor nanowires
• Proximity effect at the superconductor - topological insulator interface
• Majorana bound states in non-homogeneous semiconductor nanowires
• Two terminal charge tunneling: Disentangling Majorana zero modes from partially separated Andreev bound states in semiconductor-superconductor heterostructures
• Majorana Fermions in superconducting 1D systems having periodic, quasiperiodic, and disordered potentials
• Engineering a p+ip Superconductor: Comparison of Topological Insulator and Rashba Spin-Orbit Coupled Materials
• Majorana Fermions in superconducting wires: effects of long-range hopping, broken time-reversal symmetry and potential landscapes
• Griffiths effects and quantum critical points in dirty superconductors without spin-rotation invariance: One-dimensional examples
• Quantized zero bias conductance plateau in semiconductor-superconductor heterostructures without non-Abelian Majorana zero modes
• SNS junctions in nanowires with spin-orbit coupling: role of confinement and helicity on the sub-gap spectrum
• Probability distribution of Majorana end-state energies in disordered wires
• Topological superconducting phases in disordered quantum wires with strong spin-orbit coupling
• Splitting of Majorana modes due to intervortex tunneling in a p + ip superconductor
• Robustness of Majorana fermions in 2D topological superconductors
• Zero-energy Andreev bound states from quantum dots in proximitized Rashba nanowires
• Ubiquitous non-Majorana Zero-Bias Conductance Peaks in Nanowire Devices
• Majorana End-States in Multi-band Microstructures with Rashba Spin-Orbit Coupling
• Andreev rectifier: a nonlocal conductance signature of topological phase transitions
• Decaying spectral oscillations in a Majorana wire with finite coherence length
• Zero bias conductance peak in Majorana wires made of semiconductor-superconductor hybrid structures
• Distinguishing topological Majorana bound states from trivial Andreev bound states: Proposed tests through differential tunneling conductance spectroscopy
• Conductance Quantization at zero magnetic field in InSb nanowires
• Tunneling of anyonic Majorana excitations in topological superconductors
• Effects of electron scattering on the topological properties of nanowires: Majorana fermions from disorder and superlattices
• Conductance-matrix symmetries of a three-terminal hybrid device
• Conductance through a helical state in an InSb nanowire
• Density of states of disordered topological superconductor-semiconductor hybrid nanowires
• An experimentally accessible quality factor for Majorana wires
• Electric field tunable superconductor-semiconductor coupling in Majorana nanowires
• Distribution of the quantum mechanical time-delay matrix for a chaotic cavity
• Effective g-factor in Majorana Wires
• Majorana Fermions in Chiral Topological Ferromagnetic Nanowires
• Topologically trivial zero bias conductance peak in semiconductor Majorana wires from boundary effects
• Spin-Orbit Protection of Induced Superconductivity in Majorana Nanowires
• Shiba impurity bound states as a probe of topological superconductivity and Fermion parity changing quantum phase transitions
• Generic quantized zero-bias conductance peaks in superconductor-semiconductor hybrid structures
• Role of dissipation in realistic Majorana nanowires
• Zero-energy pinning of topologically-trivial bound states in multi-band semiconductor-superconductor nanowires
• Robust low-energy Andreev bound states in semiconductor-superconductor heterostructures: Importance of partial separation of component Majorana bound states
• Electron temperature and tunnel coupling dependence of zero-bias and almost-zero-bias conductance peaks in Majorana nanowires
• Effects of large induced superconducting gap on semiconductor Majorana nanowires
• How to infer non-Abelian statistics and topological invariants from tunneling conductance properties of realistic Majorana nanowires
• Proximity-induced low-energy renormalization in hybrid semiconductor-superconductor Majorana structures
• End-to-end correlated subgap states in hybrid nanowires
• Presence versus absence of end-to-end nonlocal conductance correlations in Majorana nanowires: Majorana bound states versus Andreev bound states
• Conductance spectroscopy of topological superconductor wire junctions
• Bulk disorder in the superconductor affects proximity-induced topological superconductivity
• Quasiclassical theory of disordered multi-channel Majorana quantum wires
• Momentum relaxation in a semiconductor proximity-coupled to a disordered s-wave superconductor: effect of scattering on topological superconductivity
• Non-locality of zero-bias anomalies in the topologically-trivial phase of Majorana wires
• Metamorphosis of Andreev bound states into Majorana bound states in pristine nanowires
• Majorana fermions in an out-of-equilibrium topological superconducting wire: an exact microscopic transport analysis of a p-wave open chain coupled to normal leads
• Subband occupation in semiconductor-superconductor nanowires
• Transport signatures of topological superconductivity in a proximity-coupled nanowire
• Soft superconducting gap in semiconductor-based Majorana nanowires
• X-shaped and Y-shaped Andreev resonance profiles in a superconducting quantum dot
• Phenomenology of soft gap, zero bias peak, and zero mode splitting in ideal Majorana nanowires
• Non-Abelian toplogical superconductors from topological semimetals and related systems under superconducting proximity effect
• Tunneling conductance in semiconductor-superconductor hybrid structures
• Curvature of gap closing features and the extraction of Majorana nanowire parameters

Cited by in corpus (178)

• Realization of a minimal Kitaev chain in coupled quantum dots
• Disorder-induced zero-bias peaks in Majorana nanowires
• Altermagnetic Routes to Majorana Modes in Zero Net Magnetization
• Nontopological zero-bias peaks in full-shell nanowires induced by flux tunable Andreev states
• Majorana nanowires for topological quantum computation
• Estimating disorder and its adverse effects in semiconductor Majorana nanowires
• Three-terminal nonlocal conductance in Majorana nanowires: Distinguishing topological and trivial in realistic systems with disorder and inhomogeneous potential
• A two-site Kitaev chain in a two-dimensional electron gas
• Roadmap towards Majorana qubits and nonabelian physics in quantum dot-based minimal Kitaev chains
• Theory of Majorana zero modes in unconventional superconductors
• Shadow-wall lithography of ballistic superconductor-semiconductor quantum devices
• Andreev reflection in the fractional quantum Hall state
• Geometry controlled superconducting diode and anomalous Josephson effect triggered by the topological phase transition in curved proximitized nanowires
• Fractional entropy of multichannel Kondo systems from conductance-charge relations
• Quantized and unquantized zero-bias tunneling conductance peaks in Majorana nanowires: Conductance below and above $2e^2/h$
• Charge impurity effects in hybrid Majorana nanowires
• In search of Majorana
• Plateau regions for zero-bias peaks within 5% of the quantized conductance value $2e^2/h$
• Distinguishing trivial and topological zero energy states in long nanowire junctions
• Signatures of a topological phase transition in a planar Josephson junction
• Probing Majorana localization in minimal Kitaev chains through a quantum dot
• Large zero bias peaks and dips in a four-terminal thin InAs-Al nanowire device
• Selective area epitaxy of PbTe-Pb hybrid nanowires on a lattice-matched substrate
• Local and Nonlocal Transport Spectroscopy in Planar Josephson Junctions
• Numerical study of PbTe-Pb hybrid nanowires for engineering Majorana zero modes
• Disorder effects on Majorana zero modes: Kitaev chain versus semiconductor nanowire
• Linear and non-linear transport across a finite Kitaev chain: an exact analytical study
• Partially-separated Majorana modes in a disordered medium
• Minimal quantum dot based Kitaev chain with only local superconducting proximity effect
• Nonlocal conductance spectroscopy of Andreev bound states in gate-defined InAs/Al nanowires
• Spectral properties, topological patches, and effective phase diagrams of finite disordered Majorana nanowires
• Enhanced topological superconductivity in spatially modulated planar Josephson junctions
• Observation of edge and bulk states in a three-site Kitaev chain
• Majorana/Andreev crossover and the fate of the topological phase transition in inhomogeneous nanowires
• Recent progress on Majorana in semiconductor-superconductor heterostructures--Engineering and detection
• Crossover between trivial zero modes in Majorana nanowires
• Formation and detection of Majorana modes in quantum spin Hall trenches
• Zero-frequency supercurrent susceptibility signatures of trivial and topological zero-energy states in nanowire junctions
• On-demand large-conductance in trivial zero-bias tunneling peaks in Majorana nanowires
• Conductance Quantization in PbTe Nanowires
• Interaction induced hybridization of Majorana zero-modes in a coupled quantum-dot hybrid-nanowire system
• Observation of Aharonov-Bohm effect in PbTe nanowire networks
• Ballistic PbTe Nanowire Devices
• Proximity effect in PbTe-Pb hybrid nanowire Josephson junctions
• One-dimensional topological superconductivity based entirely on phase control
• Gatemon qubit based on a thin InAs-Al hybrid nanowire
• Fusion rules in a Majorana single-charge transistor
• Kitaev chain in an alternating quantum dot-Andreev bound state array
• Suppressing Andreev bound state zero bias peaks using a strongly dissipative lead
• Progress in superconductor-semiconductor topological Josephson junctions
• Emergent vortex Majorana zero mode in iron-based superconductors
• Near zero-energy Caroli-de Gennes-Matricon vortex states in the presence of impurities
• Universal conductance scaling of Andreev reflections using a dissipative probe
• Mitigating disorder-induced zero-energy states in weakly-coupled semiconductor-superconductor hybrid systems
• Majorana zero modes in gate-defined germanium hole nanowires
• Majorana-like localized spin density without bound states in topologically trivial spin-orbit coupled nanowires
• Topological Kondo Device for distinguishing Quasi-Majorana and Majorana signatures
• Density of states, transport, and topology in disordered Majorana nanowires
• Majorana quasiparticles in atomic spin chains on superconductors
• Enhanced topological protection in planar quasi-one-dimensional channels with periodically-modulated width
• Quality factor for zero-bias conductance peaks in Majorana nanowire
• Selective-Area-Grown PbTe-Pb Planar Josephson Junctions for Quantum Devices
• Robust topological superconductivity in weakly coupled nanowire-superconductor hybrid structures
• Role of dephasing on the conductance signatures of Majorana zero modes
• Signatures of the Majorana spin in electrical transport through a Majorana nanowire
• Manipulation of Majorana Kramers Qubit and its Tolerance in Time-Reversal-Invariant Topological Superconductor
• Topological isoconductance signatures in Majorana nanowires
• Can non-local conductance spectra conclusively signal Majorana zero modes? -- Insights from von Neumann entropy
• Majorana bound states in encapsulated bilayer graphene
• Quantum-dot-based Kitaev chains: Majorana quality measures and scaling with increasing chain length
• Dynamical leakage of Majorana mode into side-attached quantum dot
• Detecting Majorana modes by readout of poisoning-induced parity flips
• Rabi and Ramsey oscillations of a Majorana qubit in a quantum dot-superconductor array
• Accessing the degree of Majorana nonlocality in a quantum dot-optical microcavity system
• Theory of Coulomb blockaded transport in realistic Majorana nanowires
• Machine learning optimization of Majorana hybrid nanowires
• Robust and fragile Majorana bound states in proximitized topological insulator nanoribbons
• Hard superconducting gap in PbTe nanowires
• Mobility exceeding 100,000 cm${}^2$/Vs in modulation-doped shallow InAs quantum wells coupled to epitaxial aluminum
• Effect of impurities and disorder on the braiding dynamics of Majorana zero modes
• Coexistence of Strong and Weak Majorana Zero Modes in Anisotropic XY Spin Chain with Second-Neighbor Interaction
• Majorana zero modes in twisted transition metal dichalcogenides homobilayers
• Differential current noise as an identifier of Andreev bound states that induce nearly quantized conductance plateaus
• Large Andreev bound state zero bias peaks in a weakly dissipative environment
• Machine-learned tuning of artificial Kitaev chains from tunneling-spectroscopy measurements
• Disordered Majorana nanowires: Studying disorder without any disorder
• Machine Learning the Disorder Landscape of Majorana Nanowires
• Non-Abelian Anyons and Non-Abelian Vortices in Topological Superconductors
• Spin-filtered measurements of Andreev bound states
• Multiterminal transport spectroscopy of subgap states in Coulomb-blockaded superconductors
• Electron correlation effects in superconducting nanowires in and out of equilibrium
• Trapping Majorana Zero Modes in Vortices of Magnetic Texture Crystals Coupled to Nodal Superconductors
• Interference and parity blockade in transport through a Majorana box
• Role of Bath-Induced Many-Body Interactions in the Dissipative Phases of the Su-Schrieffer-Heeger Model
• Effect of topological length on Bound states signatures in a Topological nanowire
• Josephson effect and critical currents in trivial and topological full-shell hybrid nanowires
• Supercurrent through an Andreev trimer
• Random matrix theory for the robustness, quantization, and end-to-end correlation of zero-bias conductance peaks in a class D ensemble
• Non-local transport signatures of topological superconductivity in a phase-biased planar Josephson junction
• Germanium-based hybrid semiconductor-superconductor topological quantum computing platforms: Disorder effects
• Transport features of a topological superconducting nanowire with a quantum dot: conductance and noise
• Anomalous periodicity and parafermion hybridization in superconducting qubits
• Absence of Majorana oscillations in finite-length full-shell hybrid nanowires
• Topologically nontrivial and trivial zero modes in chiral molecules
• Gate-tunable subband degeneracy in semiconductor nanowires
• Anomalous photon-assisted tunneling in periodically driven Majorana nanowires and BCS Charge Measurement
• Majorana zero modes by engineering topological kink states in two dimensional electron gas
• Probing Majorana bound states through an inhomogeneous Andreev double dot interferometer
• Diagnosing Topological Phase Transitions in 1D Superconductors using Berry Singularity Markers
• Nonequilibrium Fractional Josephson Effect
• Quantum dots as parafermion detectors
• Disorder effects on the so-called Andreev band in Majorana nanowires
• Dynamical approach to improving Majorana qubits and distinguishing them from trivial bound states
• Dephasing of Majorana qubits due to quasistatic disorder
• Subgap states in semiconductor-superconductor devices for quantum technologies: Andreev qubits and minimal Majorana chains
• Vision transformer based Deep Learning of Topological indicators in Majorana Nanowires
• InP/GaSb core-shell nanowires: a novel hole-based platform with strong spin-orbit coupling for full-shell hybrid devices
• Reducing disorder in PbTe nanowires for Majorana research
• Disorder effects in planar semiconductor-superconductor structures: Majorana wires versus Josephson junctions
• Topological gap protocol based machine learning optimization of Majorana hybrid wires
• Double Fu-teleportation and anomalous Coulomb blockade in a Majorana-hosted superconducting island
• Stabilizing topological superconductivity in disordered spin-orbit coupled semiconductor-superconductor heterostructures
• Challenges in detecting topological superconducting transitions via supercurrent and phase probes in planar Josephson junctions
• Capacitance-based Fermion parity read-out and predicted Rabi oscillations in a Majorana nanowire
• Quantized Andreev conductance in semiconductor nanowires
• Coexistence of topological and nontopological Fermi-superfluid phases
• Dressed Majorana fermion in a hybrid nanowire
• Zero energy states clustering in an elemental nanowire coupled to a superconductor
• Quantum Hall valley Ferromagnets as a platform for topologically protected quantum memory
• Proximity-induced zero-energy states indistinguishable from topological edge states
• Braiding Majoranas in a linear quantum dot-superconductor array: Mitigating the errors from Coulomb repulsion and residual tunneling
• In situ tuning of dynamical Coulomb blockade on Andreev bound states in hybrid nanowire devices
• Topological phases in the presence of disorder and longer-range couplings
• Theoretical proposal to obtain strong Majorana evidence from scanning tunneling spectroscopy of a vortex with a dissipative environment
• Anisotropy of PbTe nanowires with and without a superconductor
• Honing in on a topological zero-bias conductance peak
• Mirror-protected Majorana zero modes in $f$-wave multilayer graphene superconductors
• The differential conductance tunnel spectroscopy in an analytical solvable two-terminal Majorana device
• Detecting Topological Superconductivity via Berry Curvature Effects in Spectral Functions
• From Majorana fermions to topological quantum computation in semiconductor/superconductor heterostructures
• Spin Signature of Majorana Fermions in Topological Nodal-Point Superconductors
• Assessing bound states in a one-dimensional topological superconductor: Majorana versus Tamm
• Zero-bias conductance peaks at zero applied magnetic field due to stray fields from integrated micromagnets in hybrid nanowire quantum dots
• Majorana zero modes in semiconductor-superconductor hybrid structures: Defining topology in short and disordered nanowires through Majorana splitting
• Properties of dissipative Floquet Majorana modes using a quantum dot
• Transport-based fusion that distinguishes between Majorana and Andreev bound states
• Confinement versus interface bound states in spin-orbit coupled nanowires
• Helical and topological phase detection based on nonlocal conductance measurements in a three terminal junction
• Topological zero modes and bounded modes at smooth domain walls: Exact solutions and dualities
• Non-Abelian holonomy of Majorana zero modes coupled to a chaotic quantum dot
• Quantifying the non-Abelian property of Andreev bound states in inhomogeneous Majorana nanowires
• Enhanced superconductivity in PbTe-In hybrids
• Josephson junction arrays as a platform for topological phases of matter
• Majorana polarization in disordered heterostructures
• Exponential suppression of the topological gap in self-consistent intrinsic Majorana nanowires
• Mitigating disorder and optimizing topological indicators with vision-transformer-based neural networks in Majorana nanowires
• Strong enhancement of g-factor in PbTe-Pb hybrid nanowires
• Gate tunable enhancement of supercurrent in hybrid planar Josephson junctions
• Gapfull and gapless $1$D Topological Superconductivity in Spin-Orbit Coupled Bilayer Graphene
• Andreev bound states at boundaries of polarized 2D Fermi superfluids with s-wave pairing and spin-orbit coupling
• Confinement-induced zero-bias peaks in conventional superconductor hybrids
• Localization and Topology in Noncentrosymmetric Superconductors with Disorder
• Rashba spin-orbit coupling and artificially engineered topological superconductors
• Renormalization group analysis of weakly interacting van der Waals Fermi system
• Excess photon-assisted noise of Majorana and Andreev bound states
• Majorana modes in graphene strips: polarization, wavefunctions, disorder, and Andreev states
• Absence of Quasi-Majorana False Positives in Full-Shell Hybrid Nanowires
• Signatures of Majorana bound states in scanning gate microscopy of hybrid nanowires
• Shot noise signatures identifying non-Abelian properties of Jackiw-Rebbi zero modes
• Nonlocal signatures of hybridization between quantum dot and Andreev bound states
• Realizing Majorana Kramers pairs in two-channel InAs-Al nanowires with highly misaligned electric fields
• Zero energy modes with Gaussian, exponential, or polynomial decay: Exact solutions in hermitian and nonhermitian regimes
• Gap Anisotropy in Layered Superconductors Due to Rashba and Dresselhaus Spin-Orbit Interactions
• Zero and Nonzero Energy Majorana Modes in an Extended Kitaev Chain
• Proximity-induced superconductivity generated by thin films: Effects of Fermi surface mismatch and disorder in the superconductor
• Creating and detecting poor man's Majorana bound states in interacting quantum dots
• Presence versus absence of charging energies in PbTe quantum dots
• Ballistic transport in 1D Rashba systems in the context of Majorana nanowires