2021/12/02 by Jiashu Wang, William Powers, William E. Powers +14
Materials Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Condensed Matter Physics #Condensed matter physics #Electronic and Structural Properties of Oxides #Epitaxy #MAJORANA #Magnetic field #Magnetoresistance #Materials science #Molecular beam epitaxy #Nanotechnology #Pairing #Physics #Quantum mechanics #Superconductivity #Topological Materials and Phenomena #Topological insulator #Topology (electrical circuits) #Weak localization #cond-mat.mes-hall #cond-mat.supr-con
paper · pdf · doi:10.1021/acs.nanolett.1c04370
Manuscript in review
arxiv created 2021/12/02 · openalex publication_date 2022/01/10 · arxiv updated 2022/02/09 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/30
Topological superconductors have attracted tremendous excitement as they are predicted to host Majorana zero modes that can be utilized for topological quantum computing. Candidate topological superconductor Sn 1– x In x Te thin films (0 < x < 0.3) grown by molecular beam epitaxy and strained in the (111) plane are shown to host quantum interference effects in the conductivity coexisting with superconducting fluctuations above the critical temperature T c . An analysis of the normal state magnetoresistance reveals these effects. A crossover from weak antilocalization to localization is consistently observed in superconducting samples, indicating that superconductivity originates dominantly from charge carriers occupying trivial states that may be strongly spin–orbit split. A large enhancement of the conductivity is observed above T c, indicating the presence of superconducting fluctuations. Our results motivate a re-examination of the debated pairing symmetry of this material when subjected to quantum confinement and lattice strain.