Transport signatures of quasiparticle poisoning in a Majorana island

S. M. Albrecht, E. B. Hansen, A. P. Higginbotham, F. Kuemmeth, T. S. Jespersen, J. Nygård, Peter Krogstrup Jeppesen, J. Danon, K. Flensberg, C. M. Marcus

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Abstract

We investigate effects of quasiparticle poisoning in a Majorana island with strong tunnel coupling to normal-metal leads. In addition to the main Coulomb blockade diamonds, "shadow" diamonds appear, shifted by 1e in gate voltage, consistent with transport through an excited (poisoned) state of the island. Comparison to a simple model yields an estimate of parity lifetime for the strongly coupled island (~ 1 {\mu}s) and sets a bound for a weakly coupled island (> 10 {\mu}s). Fluctuations in the gate-voltage spacing of Coulomb peaks at high field, reflecting Majorana hybridization, are enhanced by the reduced lever arm at strong coupling. In energy units, fluctuations are consistent with previous measurements.
Original languageEnglish
Article number137701
JournalPhysical Review Letters
Volume118
Issue number13
Number of pages6
ISSN0031-9007
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 27 Mar 2017

Bibliographical note

[Qdev]

Keywords

  • cond-mat.mes-hall
  • cond-mat.supr-con
  • quant-ph

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