Theory of Coulomb blockaded transport in realistic Majorana nanowires

Abstract

Coulomb blockaded transport of topological superconducting nanowires provides an opportunity to probe the localization of states at both ends of the system in a two-terminal geometry. In addition, it provides a way for checking for subgap states away from the leads. At the same time, Coulomb blockade transport is difficult to analyze because of the interacting nature of the problem arising from the nonperturbative Coulomb interaction inherent in the phenomenon. Here we show that the Coulomb blockade transport can be modeled at the same level of complexity as quantum point contact tunneling that has routinely been used in mesoscopic physics to understand nanowire experiments provided we consider the regime where the tunneling rate is below the equilibration rate of the nanowire. This assumption leads us to a generalized Meir-Wingreen formula for the tunnel conductance which we use to study various features of the nanowire such as Andreev bound states, self-energy, and soft gap. We anticipate that our theory will provide a route to interpret Coulomb blockade transport in hybrid Majorana systems as resulting from features of the nanowire, such as Andreev bound states and soft gaps.

arXiv comment31 pages, 14 figures

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Cited by in corpus (9)

• Disorder-induced zero-bias peaks in Majorana nanowires
• Estimating disorder and its adverse effects in semiconductor Majorana nanowires
• Random matrix theory for the robustness, quantization, and end-to-end correlation of zero-bias conductance peaks in a class D ensemble
• Double Fu-teleportation and anomalous Coulomb blockade in a Majorana-hosted superconducting island
• Richardson model with complex level structure and spin-orbit coupling for hybrid superconducting islands: stepwise suppression of pairing and magnetic pinning
• Fate of the superconducting state in floating islands of hybrid nanowire devices
• Majorana zero modes in semiconductor-superconductor hybrid structures: Defining topology in short and disordered nanowires through Majorana splitting
• Matrix product state simulations of quantum quenches and transport in Coulomb blockaded superconducting devices
• Electronic transport in double-nanowire superconducting islands with multiple terminals