arXiv subjects

Rok Žitko

Publications and source records attributed to Rok Žitko.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2022

Direct manipulation of a superconducting spin qubit strongly coupled to a transmon qubit

Spin qubits in semiconductors are currently one of the most promising architectures for quantum computing. However, they face challenges in realizing multi-qubit interactions over extended distances. Superconducting spin qubits provide a promising alternative by encoding a qubit in the spin degree of freedom of an Andreev level. Such an Andreev spin qubit could leverage the advantages of circuit quantum electrodynamic, enabled by an intrinsic spin-supercurrent coupling. The first realization of an Andreev spin qubit encoded the qubit in the excited states of a semiconducting weak-link, leading to frequent decay out of the computational subspace. Additionally, rapid qubit manipulation was hindered by the need for indirect Raman transitions. Here, we exploit a different qubit subspace, using the spin-split doublet ground state of an electrostatically-defined quantum dot Josephson junction with large charging energy. Additionally, we use a magnetic field to enable direct spin manipulation over a frequency range of 10 GHz. Using an all-electric microwave drive we achieve Rabi frequencies exceeding 200 MHz. We furthermore embed the Andreev spin qubit in a superconducting transmon qubit, demonstrating strong coherent qubit-qubit coupling. These results are a crucial step towards a hybrid architecture that combines the beneficial aspects of both superconducting and semiconductor qubits.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2022

Yu-Shiba-Rusinov states, the BCS-BEC crossover, and the exact solution in the flat-band limit

We study the subgap Yu-Shiba-Rusinov (YSR) states in the Richardson's model of a superconductor with a magnetic impurity for different electron pairing strengths from the weak-coupling Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) regime to the strong-coupling Bose-Einstein-condensate (BEC) regime. We observe that the effect of the increasing pairing strength on the YSR excitation spectrum as a function of hybridisation strength and impurity on-site potential is only quantitative and, in fact, rather weak when the results are appropriately rescaled. We furthermore show that the problem is analytically solvable in the deep BEC limit which is equivalent to flat-band superconductivity. This exact solution can be related to a zero-bandwidth (ZBW) effective BCS mean field Hamiltonian where the superconductor is described by a single electron level with onsite pairing. The small difference between the BCS and BEC regimes of the Richardson's model explains the success of the simple ZBW calculations for BCS mean-field Hamiltonians. A ZBW model requires only a suitable parameter rescaling to become useful as a quantitative predictive tool for the full problem.

cond-mat.supr-con↗

arXiv2022

Singlet-doublet transitions of a quantum dot Josephson junction detected in a transmon circuit

We realize a hybrid superconductor-semiconductor transmon device in which the Josephson effect is controlled by a gate-defined quantum dot in an InAs/Al nanowire. Microwave spectroscopy of the transmon's transition spectrum allows us to probe the ground state parity of the quantum dot as a function of gate voltages, external magnetic flux, and magnetic field applied parallel to the nanowire. The measured parity phase diagram is in agreement with that predicted by a single-impurity Anderson model with superconducting leads. Through continuous time monitoring of the circuit we furthermore resolve the quasiparticle dynamics of the quantum dot Josephson junction across the phase boundaries. Our results can facilitate the realization of semiconductor-based $0-π$ qubits and Andreev qubits.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2022

Excitations in a superconducting Coulombic energy gap

Cooper pairing and Coulomb repulsion are antagonists, producing distinct energy gaps in superconductors and Mott insulators. When a superconductor exchanges unpaired electrons with a quantum dot, its gap is populated by a pair of electron-hole symmetric Yu-Shiba-Rusinov excitations between doublet and singlet many-body states. The fate of these excitations in the presence of a strong Coulomb repulsion in the superconductor is unknown, but of importance in applications such as topological superconducting qubits and multi-channel impurity models. Here we couple a quantum dot to a superconducting island with a tunable Coulomb repulsion. We show that a strong Coulomb repulsion changes the singlet many-body state into a two-body state. It also breaks the electron-hole energy symmetry of the excitations, which thereby lose their Yu-Shiba-Rusinov character.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2021

Qubit based on spin-singlet Yu-Shiba-Rusinov states

The local magnetic moment of an interacting quantum dot occupied by a single electron can be screened by binding a Bogoliubov quasiparticle from a nearby superconductor. This gives rise to a long-lived discrete spin-singlet state inside the superconducting gap, known as the Yu-Shiba-Rusinov (YSR) state. We study the nature of the subgap states induced by a quantum dot embedded between two small superconducting islands. We show that this system has two spin-singlet subgap states with different spatial charge distributions. These states can be put in a linear superposition and coherently manipulated using electric-field pulses applied on the gate electrode. Such YSR qubit could be implemented using present-day technology.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2021

Subgap states in superconducting islands

We study an interacting quantum dot in contact with a superconducting island described by the Richardson model with a Coulomb repulsion term controlling the number of electrons on the island. This Hamiltonian admits a compact matrix-product-operator representation and can be efficiently and accurately solved using the density-matrix renormalization group. We systematically explore the effects of the charging energy $E_c$. For $E_c$ comparable to the superconducting gap $Δ$, the subgap states are stabilized by the combination of Kondo exchange coupling and charge redistribution driven by the Coulomb interaction. The subgap states exist for both even and odd superconductor ground-state occupancy, but with very distinctive excitation spectra in each case. The spectral peaks are not symmetric with respect to the chemical potential and may undergo discontinuous changes as a function of gate voltages.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2021

Single-shot Stern-Gerlach magnetic gradiometer with an expanding cloud of cold cesium atoms

We combine the Ramsey interferometry protocol, the Stern-Gerlach detection scheme, and the use of elongated geometry of a cloud of fully polarized cold cesium atoms to measure the selected component of the magnetic field gradient along the atomic cloud in a single shot. In contrast to the standard method where the precession of two spatially separated atomic clouds is simultaneously measured to extract their phase difference, which is proportional to the magnetic field gradient, we here demonstrate a gradiometer using a single image of an expanding atomic cloud with the phase difference imprinted along the cloud. Using resonant radio-frequency pulses and Stern-Gerlach imaging, we first demonstrate nutation and Larmor precession of atomic magnetization in an applied magnetic field. Next, we let the cold atom cloud expand in one dimension and apply the protocol for measuring the magnetic field gradient. The resolution of our single-shot gradiometer is not limited by thermal motion of atoms and has an estimated absolute accuracy below $\pm0.2$~mG/cm ($\pm20$~nT/cm).

physics.atom-ph↗

arXiv2021

Coupled Yu-Shiba-Rusinov states induced by a many-body molecular spin on a superconductor

A magnetic impurity on a superconductor induces Yu-Shiba-Rusinov (YSR) bound states, detected by tunneling spectroscopy as long-lived quasiparticle excitations inside the superconducting gap. Coupled YSR states constitute basic elements to engineer artificial superconducting states, but their substrate-mediated interactions are generally weak. In this paper, we report that intramolecular (Hund's like) exchange interactions produce coupled YSR states across a molecular platform. We measured YSR spectra along a magnetic iron-porphyrin on Pb(111) and found evidences of two orbital interaction channels, which invert their particle-hole asymmetry across the molecule. Numerical calculations show that the identical YSR asymmetry pattern of the two channels is caused by two spin-hosting orbitals with opposite potential scattering and coupled strongly. Both channels can be similarly excited by tunneling electrons into each orbital, depicting a new scenario for entangled superconducting bound states using molecular platforms.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2020

Emission of correlated jets from a driven matter-wave soliton in a quasi-one-dimensional geometry

We demonstrate the emission of correlated atom jets from a matter-wave soliton in a quasi-one-dimensional optical trap. We characterize the dependence of jet properties on the frequency, amplitude and length of the modulation, and qualitatively reproduce the trends in the mean-field picture with a one-dimensional time-dependent Gross-Pitaevskii equation simulation. High-order jets are observed for sufficiently long pulses. A double-pulse modulation sequence produces consecutive jets, and a multi-pulse sequence may lead to irregular 3D jets at a finite angle to the direction of the channel. In the limit of vanishing high-order jets beyond-mean-field number correlations of jet pairs are demonstrated, implying possible number squeezing.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2019

Observation of Coexistence of Yu-Shiba-Rusinov States and Spin-Flip Excitations

We investigate the spectral evolution in different metal phthalocyanine molecules on NbSe$_2$ surface using scanning tunnelling microscopy (STM) as a function of the coupling with the substrate. For manganese phthalocyanine (MnPc), we demonstrate a smooth spectral crossover from Yu-Shiba-Rusinov (YSR) bound states to spin-flip excitations. This has not been observed previously and it is in contrast to simple theoretical expectations. We corroborate the experimental findings using numerical renormalization group calculations. Our results provide fundamental new insight on the behavior of atomic scale magnetic/SC hybrid systems, which is important for e.g. engineered topological superconductors and spin logic devices.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2019

Cesium bright matter-wave solitons and soliton trains

A study of bright matter-wave solitons of a cesium Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) is presented. Production of a single soliton is demonstrated and dependence of soliton atom number on the interatomic interaction is investigated. Formation of soliton trains in the quasi one-dimensional confinement is shown. Additionally, fragmentation of a BEC has been observed outside confinement, in free space. In the end a double BEC production setup for studying soliton collisions is described.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

arXiv2018

Mottness collapse without metallisation in the domain walls of triangular-lattice Mott insulator 1T-TaS$_2$

1T-TaS$_2$ is a charge-density-wave (CDW) compound with a Mott-insulating ground state. The metallic state obtained by doping, substitution or pulsed charge injection is characterized by an emergent CDW domain wall network, while single domain walls can be found in the pristine Mott state. Here we study whether and how the single walls become metallic. Tunneling spectroscopy reveals partial suppression of the Mott gap and the presence of in-gap states strongly localized at the domain-wall sites. Using the real-space dynamical mean field theory description of the strongly correlated quantum-paramagnet ground state we show that the local gap suppression follows from the increased hopping along the connected zig-zag chain of lattice sites forming the domain wall, and that full metallisation is preempted by the splitting of the quasiparticle band into bonding and antibonding sub-bands due to the structural dimerization of the wall, explaining the presence of the in-gap states and the low density of states at the Fermi level.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2017

A Strange Metal from Gutzwiller correlations in infinite dimensions

Recent progress in extremely correlated Fermi liquid theory (ECFL) and dynamical mean field theory (DMFT) enables us to compute in the $d \to \infty$ limit the resistivity of the $t-J$ model after setting $J\to0$. This is also the $U=\infty$ Hubbard model. We study three densities $n=.75,.8,.85$ that correspond to a range between the overdoped and optimally doped Mott insulating state. We delineate four distinct regimes characterized by different behaviors of the resistivity $ρ$. We find at the lowest $T$ a Gutzwiller Correlated Fermi Liquid regime with $ρ\propto T^2$ extending up to an effective Fermi temperature that is dramatically suppressed from the non-interacting value. This is followed by a Gutzwiller Correlated Strange Metal regime with $ρ\propto (T-T_0)$, i.e. a linear resistivity extrapolating back to $ρ=0$ at a positive $T_0$. At a higher $T$ scale, this crosses over into the Bad Metal regime with $ρ\propto (T+T_1)$ extrapolating back to a finite resistivity at $T=0$, and passing through the Ioffe-Regel-Mott value where the mean free path is a few lattice constants. This regime finally gives way to the High $T$ Metal regime, where we find $ρ\propto T$. The present work emphasizes the first two, where the availability of an analytical ECFL theory is of help in identifying the changes in related variables entering the resistivity formula that accompany the onset of linear resistivity, and the numerically exact DMFT helps to validate the results. We also examine thermodynamic variables such as the magnetic susceptibility, compressibility, heat capacity and entropy, and correlate changes in these with the change in resistivity. This exercise casts valuable light on the nature of charge and spin correlations in the strange metal regime, which has features in common with the physically relevant strange metal phase seen in strongly correlated matters.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2017

A Strange Metal from Gutzwiller correlations in infinite dimensions II: Transverse Transport, Optical Response and Rise of Two Relaxation Rates

Using two approaches to strongly correlated systems, the extremely correlated Fermi liquid theory and the dynamical mean field theory, we compute the transverse transport coefficients, namely the Hall constants $R_H$ and Hall angles $θ_H$, and also the longitudinal and transverse optical response of the $U=\infty$ Hubbard model in the limit of infinite dimensions. We focus on two successive low-temperature regimes, the Gutzwiller correlated Fermi liquid (GCFL) and the Gutzwiller correlated strange metal (GCSM). We find that the Hall angles $\cot θ_H \propto T^2$ in the GCFL regime, on warming into the strange metal regime, it passes through a downward bend and continues as $T^2$. Equivalently, $R_H$ is weakly temperature dependent in the GCFL regime, and becomes strongly $T$-dependent in the GCSM regime. Drude peaks are found for both the longitudinal optical conductivity $σ_{xx}(ω)$ and the optical Hall angles $\tan θ_H(ω)$ below certain characteristic energy scales. By comparing the relaxation rates extracted from fitting to the Drude formula, we find that in the GCFL regime there is a single relaxation rate controlling both longitudinal and transverse transport, while in the GCSM regime two independent relaxation rates emerge. We trace the origin of this behavior to the dynamical particle-hole asymmetry of the Dyson self-energy, arguably a generic feature of doped Mott insulators.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2016

Fine structure of the spectra of the Kondo lattice model: two-site cellular DMFT study

We study the antiferromagnetic and the paramagnetic Kondo insulator phases of the Kondo lattice model on the cubic lattice at half-filling using the cellular dynamical mean-field theory (CDMFT) with numerical renormalization group (NRG) as the impurity solver, focusing on the fine details of the spectral function and self-energy. We find that the non-local correlations increase the gap in both the antiferromagnetic and the Kondo insulator phase and shrink the extent of the antiferromagnetic phase in the phase diagram but do not alter any properties qualitatively. The agreement between the numerical CDMFT results and those within a simple hybridization picture, which adequately describes the overall band structure of the system but neglects all effects on the inelastic-scattering processes, is similar to that of the single-site DMFT results; there are deviations that are responsible for the additional fine structure, in particular for the asymmetric spectral resonances or dips that become more pronounced in the strong-coupling regime close to the antiferromagnet-paramagnetic quantum phase transition. These features appear broader in the CDMFT mostly due to numerical artifacts linked to more aggressive state truncation required in the NRG.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2016

Transport and Optical Conductivity in the Hubbard Model: A High-Temperature Expansion Perspective

We derive analytical expressions for the spectral moments of the dynamical response functions of the Hubbard model using the high-temperature series expansion. We consider generic dimension $d$ as well as the infinite-$d$ limit, arbitrary electron density $n$, and both finite and infinite repulsion $U$. We use moment-reconstruction methods to obtain the one-electron spectral function, the self-energy, and the optical conductivity. They are all smooth functions at high-temperature and, at large-$U$, they are featureless with characteristic widths of order the lattice hopping parameter $t$. In the infinite-$d$ limit we compare the series expansion results with accurate numerical renormalization group and interaction expansion quantum Monte-Carlo results. We find excellent agreement down to surprisingly low temperatures, throughout most of the bad-metal regime which applies for $T \gtrsim (1-n)D$, the Brinkman-Rice scale. The resistivity increases linearly in $T$ at high-temperature without saturation. This results from the $1/T$ behaviour of the compressibility or kinetic energy, which play the role of the effective carrier number. In contrast, the scattering time (or diffusion constant) saturate at high-$T$. We find that $σ(n,T) \approx (1-n)σ(n=0,T)$ to a very good approximation for all $n$, with $σ(n=0,T)\propto t/T$ at high temperatures. The saturation at small $n$ occurs due to a compensation between the density-dependence of the effective number of carriers and that of the scattering time. The $T$-dependence of the resistivity displays a knee-like feature which signals a cross-over to the intermediate-temperature regime where the diffusion constant (or scattering time) start increasing with decreasing $T$. At high-temperatures, the thermopower obeys the Heikes formula, while the Wiedemann-Franz law is violated with the Lorenz number vanishing as $1/T^2$.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2016

Non-Fermi-liquid behavior in quantum impurity models with superconducting channels

We study how the non-Fermi-liquid nature of the overscreened multi-channel Kondo impurity model affects the response to a BCS pairing term that, in the absence of the impurity, opens a gap $Δ$. We find that non-Fermi liquid features do persist even at finite $Δ$: the local density of states lacks coherence peaks, the states in the continuum above the gap are unconventional, and the boundary entropy is a non-monotonic function of temperature. Even more surprisingly, we also find that the low-energy spectrum in the limit $Δ\to 0$ actually does not correspond to the spectrum strictly at $Δ=0$. In particular, the $Δ\to 0$ ground state is an orbitally degenerate spin-singlet, while it is an orbital singlet with a residual spin degeneracy at $Δ=0$. In addition, there are fractionalized spin-1/2 sub-gap excitations whose energy in units of $Δ$ tends towards a finite and universal value when $Δ\to 0$; as if the universality of the anomalous power-law exponents that characterise the overscreened Kondo effect turned into universal energy ratios when the scale invariance is broken by $Δ\not=0$. This intriguing phenomenon can be explained by the renormalisation flow towards the overscreened fixed point and the gap cutting off the orthogonality catastrophe singularities.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2013

Nanostructured and Modulated Low-Dimensional Systems

Charge density wave (CDW) ordering in NbSe3 and the structurally related quasi one-dimensional compounds is reconsidered. Since the modulated ground state is characterized by unstable nano-domains, the structural information obtained from diffraction experiments is to be supplemented by some additional information from a method, able to reveal details on a unit cell level. Low-temperature (LT) scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) can resolve both, the local atomic structure and the superimposed charge density modulation. It is shown that the established model for NbSe3 with two incommensurate (IC) modes, q1 = (0,0.241,0) and q2 = (0.5,0.260,0.5), locked in at T1=144K and T2=59K and separately confined to two of the three available types of bi-capped trigonal prismatic (BCTP) columns, must be modified. The alternative explanation is based on the existence of modulated layered nano-domains and is in good accord with the available LT STM results. These confirm i.a. the presence of both IC modes above the lower CDW transition temperature. Two BCTP columns, belonging to a symmetry-related pair, are as a rule alternatively modulated by the two modes. Such pairs of columns are ordered into unstable layered nano-domains, whose q1 and q2 sub-layers are easily interchanged. The mutually interchangeable sections of the two unstable IC modes keep a temperature dependent long-range ordering. Both modes can formally be replaced by a single highly inharmonic long-period commensurate CDW.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗