Atomic scale 0-pi transition in a high-Tc superconductor/ferromagnetic-insulator/high-T superconductor Josephson junction

TL;DR

This paper investigates atomic-scale 0-pi transitions in high-Tc superconductor/ferromagnetic-insulator/high-Tc superconductor Josephson junctions, revealing ground state alternations and proposing experimental observation methods for potential quantum computing applications.

Contribution

It demonstrates the formation of atomic-scale 0-pi transitions in high-Tc Josephson junctions and suggests their use in quantum bits.

Findings

Formation of pi-junctions in the studied systems

Ground state alternates between 0 and pi with FI thickness

Proposal for experimental observation of atomic-scale transitions

Abstract

We study the Josephson transport in a high-Tc superconductor/ferromagnetic-insulator(FI)/high-Tc superconductor numerically. We found the formation of a pi-junction in such systems. More remarkably the ground state of such junction alternates between 0- and pi-states when thickness of FI is increasing by a single atomic layer. We propose an experimental setup for observing the atomic-scale 0-pi transition. Such FI-based pi-junctions can be used to implement highly-coherent quantum bits.