arXiv · 1503.04207
Quench dynamics of fermion-parity switches in a Josephson junction
Abstract
A Josephson junction may be driven through a transition where the superconducting condensate favors an odd over an even number of electrons. At this switch in the ground-state fermion parity, an Andreev bound state crosses through the Fermi level, producing a zero-mode that can be probed by a point contact to a grounded metal. We calculate the time-dependent charge transfer between superconductor and metal for a linear sweep through the transition. One single quasiparticle is exchanged with charge $Q$ depending on the coupling energies $γ_1,γ_2$ of the metal to the Majorana operators of the zero-mode. For a single-channel point contact, $Q$ equals the electron charge $e$ in the adiabatic limit of slow driving, while in the opposite quenched limit $Q=2e\sqrt{γ_1γ_2}/(γ_1+γ_2)$ varies between $0$ and $e$. This provides a method to produce single charge-neutral quasiparticles on demand.
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B. Tarasinski, D. Chevallier, Jimmy A. Hutasoit, B. Baxevanis, C. W. J. Beenakker. 2015-09-18. Quench dynamics of fermion-parity switches in a Josephson junction. https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevb.92.144306
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