Supercurrent-induced Anomalous Thermal Hall Effect as a New Probe to Superconducting Gap Anisotropy

Abstract

Two-dimensional superconductors have been realized in various atomically thin films such as the twisted bilayer graphene, some of which are anticipated to involve unconventional pairing mechanism. Due to their low dimensionality, experimental probes of the exact nature of superconductivity in these systems have been limited. We propose, by applying a \emph{vertical} supercurrent to a bilayer superconductor where the mirror symmetry is naturally broken by the twisting, there will be anomalous thermal Hall effect induced by the supercurrent that can serve as a sharp probe for the \emph{in-plane} anisotropy of the superconducting gap function. This effect occurs in the \emph{absence} of an external magnetic field and spontaneous breaking of the time-reversal symmetry in the ground state. We derive explicit formulas for the induced thermal Hall conductivity and show them to be significant in the examples of twisted cuprates and twisted FeSe where monolayer superconductivity have already been observed. Though technical challenges still exist, we propose this to be a generic probe of the gap anisotropy in a twisted bilayer superconductor.