We determine the critical Zeeman energy splitting for Fermi superfluidity at infinite s-wave scattering length according to the Monte Carlo and experimental results of the equations of state. Based on the universality hypothesis, we show that there exist two critical fields $H_{c1}$ and $H_{c2}$, between which a superfluid-normal mixed phase is energetically favored, and model-independent formulae for $H_{c1}$, $H_{c2}$ and the critical population imbalance $P_c$ are derived. Using recent Monte Carlo and experimental results of $P_c$, $H_{c1}$ and $H_{c2}$ are determined. It is found $H_{c1}=0.41ε_{\text F}$ and $H_{c2}=0.50ε_{\text F}$, with $ε_{\text F}$ being the Fermi energy of non-interacting gas.
Topological superfluids are recently discovered quantum matters that host topologically protected gapless edge states known as Majorana fermions - exotic quantum particles that act as their own anti-particles and obey non-Abelian statistics. Their realizations are believed to lie at the heart of future technologies such as fault-tolerant quantum computation. To date, the most efficient scheme to create topological superfluids and Majorana fermions is based on the Sau-Lutchyn-Tewari-Das Sarma model with a Rashba-type spin-orbit coupling on the }\textbf{\textit{x-y}}\textbf{ plane and a large ou…
We present a theoretical study of the superfluidity and the corresponding collective modes in two-component atomic Fermi gases with s-wave attraction and synthetic Rashba spin-orbit coupling. The general effective action for the collective modes is derived from the functional path integral formalism. By tuning the spin-orbit coupling from weak to strong, the system undergoes a crossover from an ordinary BCS/BEC superfluid to a Bose-Einstein condensate of rashbons. We show that the properties of the superfluid density and the Anderson-Bogoliubov mode manifest this crossover. At large spin-orbit…
Andreev reflection in ferromagnet-superconductor junctions is derived in a regime in which Zeeman splitting dominates the response of the superconductor to an applied magnetic field. Spin-up and spin-down Andreev reflections are shown to be resolved as voltage is increased. In the metallic limit, the transition from Andreev to tunnel conductivity in the spin-up channels has a non trivial behavior when spin polarization is increased. The conductance is asymmetric in a voltage reversal.
We describe the far from equilibrium non-local transport in a diffusive superconducting wire with a Zeeman splitting, taking into account the different spin relaxation mechanisms. We demonstrate that due to the Zeeman splitting an injection of a current in a superconducting wire creates a spin accumulation that can only relax via thermalization. In addition the Zeeman splitting also causes a suppression of the spin-orbit and spin-flip scattering rates. These two effects lead to long-range spin and charge accumulations detectable in the non-local signal. Our model explains the main qualitative …
We derive the theoretical and numerical framework for investigating nonequilibrium properties of spin-orbit coupled wires with Zeeman splitting proximized by a superconductor in the non-linear diffusive regime. We demonstrate that the anisotropic behaviour of triplet Cooper pairs in this system leads to novel spin accumulation profiles tunable by the magnetic field and strength of applied voltage bias. This paves the way for enhanced manipulation of superconducting spintronic devices, and enables further investigation of nonequilibrium effects in proximity-coupled superconducting structures mo…
We have studied the acoustic Faraday effect in superfluid 3He up to significantly larger magnetic fields than in previous experiments achieving rotations of the polarization of transverse sound as large as 1710^{\circ}. We report nonlinear field effects, and use the linear results to determine the Zeeman splitting of the imaginary squashing mode (ISQ) frequency in 3He-B.
We study coherent transport through a semiconductor nanowire in the presence of spin-orbit coupling and Zeeman splitting due to an applied magnetic field. By employing analytical and numerical techniques we develop a theory for the Josephson effect in the superconductor-semiconductor nanowire-superconductor structure. We show that Josephson current through the clean semiconductor nanowire exhibits a number of interesting features due to the interplay between the Zeeman splitting and spin-orbit coupling. We also study effect how disorder in the nanowire affects Andreev bound-state energy spectr…
We theoretically investigate the inhomogeneous Fulde-Ferrell (FF) superfluidity in a three dimensional atomic Fermi gas with Rashba spin-orbit coupling near a broad Feshbach resonance. We show that within mean-field theory the FF superfluid state is always more favorable than the standard Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) superfluid state when an in-plane Zeeman field is applied. We present a qualitative finite-temperature phase diagram near resonance and argue that the predicted FF superfluid is observable with experimentally attainable temperatures (i.e., $T\sim0.2T_{F}$, where $T_{F}$ is the …
The hunt for high temperature superfluidity has received new impetus from the discovery of atomically thin stable materials. Electron-hole superfluidity in coupled MoSe2-WSe2 monolayers is investigated using a mean-field multiband model that includes the band splitting caused by the strong spin-orbit coupling. The splitting leads to a large energy misalignment of the electron and hole bands which can be markedly changed by interchanging the doping of the monolayers. The choice of doping determines if the superfluidity is tuneable from one- to two-components. The electron-hole pairing is strong…
We report on nonlocal transport in multiterminal superconductor-ferromagnet structures, which were fabricated by means of e-beam lithography and shadow evaporation techniques. In the presence of a significant Zeeman splitting of the quasiparticle states, we find signatures of spin transport over distances of several μm, exceeding other length scales such as the coherence length, the normal-state spin-diffusion length, and the charge-imbalance length. The relaxation length of the spin signal shows a nearly linear increase with magnetic field, hinting at a freeze-out of relaxation by the Zeeman …
We develop a theory of spin relaxation in Zeeman-splitted superconducting films at low temperatures. A new mechanism of spin relaxation, specific only for Zeeman-splitted superconductors is proposed. It can explain the extremely high spin relaxation lengths, experimentally observed in Zeeman-splitted superconductors, and their strong growth with the magnetic field. In the framework of this mechanism the observed spin signal is formed by the spin-independent nonequilibrium quasiparticle distribution weighted by the spin-split DOS. We demonstrate that the relaxation length of such a spin signal …
We analyze new spin effects in current-carrying state of superconductor-2D electron gas-superconductor (S-2DEG-S) device with spin-polarized nuclei in 2DEG region. The hyperfine interaction of 2D electrons with nuclear spins, described by the effective magnetic field B, produces Zeeman splitting of Andreev levels without orbital effects, that leads to the interference pattern of supercurrent oscillations over B. The spin-orbit effects in 2DEG cause strongly anisotropic dependence of the Josephson current on the direction of B, which may be used as a probe for the spin-orbit interaction intensi…
We theoretically predict an exotic topological superfluid state with spatially modulated pairing gap in one-dimensional spin-orbit-coupled Fermi gases. This inhomogeneous topological superfluidity is induced by applying simultaneously a perpendicular Zeeman magnetic field and an equally weighted Rashba and Dresselhaus spin-orbit coupling in one-dimensional optical lattices. Based on the self-consistent Bogoliubov--de Gennes theory, we confirm that this novel topological phase is a unique condensation of Cooper pairs, which manifests the interplay between the inhomogeneity of superfluid and its…
Interlayer tunneling resistivity is used to probe the low-energy density-of-states (DOS) depletion due to the pseudogap in the normal state of Bi$_2$Sr$_2$CaCu$_2$O$_{8+y}$. Measurements up to 60 T reveal that a field that restores DOS to its ungapped state shows strikingly different temperature and doping dependencies from the characteristic fields of the superconducting state. The pseudogap closing field and the pseudogap temperature $T^{\star}$ evaluated independently are related through a simple Zeeman energy scaling. These findings indicate a predominant role of spins over the orbital eff…
We study the superconducting order in a two-dimensional square lattice Hubbard model with weak repulsive interactions, subject to a Zeeman field and weak Rashba spin-orbit interactions. Diagonalizing the non-interacting Hamiltonian leads to two separate bands, and by deriving an effective low-energy interaction we find the mean field gap equations for the superconducting order parameter on the bands. Solving the gap equations just below the critical temperature, we find that superconductivity is caused by Kohn-Luttinger type interaction, while the pairing symmetry of the bands are indirectly a…
Larkin-Ovchinnikov (LO) state which combines the superfluidity and spatial periodicity of pairing order parameter and exhibits the supersolid properties has been attracting intense attention in both condensed matter physics and ultracold atoms. Conventionally, realization of LO state from an intrinsic s-wave interacting system necessitates to break the time-reversal (TR) and sometimes spatial-inversion (SI) symmetries. Here we report a novel prediction that the LO state can be realized in a TR and SI symmetric system representing a bilayer Fermi gas subjected to a laserassisted interlayer tunn…
Superconductor insulator transition in transverse magnetic field is studied in the highly disordered MoC film with the product of the Fermi momentum and the mean free path $k_F*l$ close to unity. Surprisingly, the Zeeman paramagnetic effects dominate over orbital coupling on both sides of the transition. In superconducting state it is evidenced by a high upper critical magnetic field $B_{c2}$, by its square root dependence on temperature, as well as by the Zeeman splitting of the quasiparticle density of states (DOS) measured by scanning tunneling microscopy. At $B_{c2}$ a logarithmic anomaly …
The two-dimensional nature of graphene Josephson junctions offers the possibility of creating effective superconductor-ferromagnet-superconductor junctions with tunable Zeeman splitting caused by an in-plane magnetic field. Such junctions would be able to alternate between a conventional superconducting ground state and a ground state with an intrinsic phase difference, making them controllable $0-π$ Josephson junctions. However, in addition to the Zeeman splitting, an in-plane magnetic field will in general also produce an orbital effect because of height variations in graphene, colloquially …