Chiral Topological Superconductors Enhanced by Long-Range Interactions

TL;DR

This paper explores how long-range interactions in a 2D p-wave superconductor lead to new topological phases and edge states, including enhanced chiral phases and nonlocal Majorana fermions, with implications for experimental systems.

Contribution

It introduces novel topological phases and edge states arising from long-range couplings in 2D p-wave superconductors, extending understanding beyond short-range models.

Findings

Long-range couplings significantly enhance certain chiral topological phases.

Discovery of nonlocal Majorana edge states that remain robust and gapped.

Potential relevance to experiments with magnetic impurities in 2D superconductors.

Abstract

We study the phase diagram and edge states of a two-dimensional p-wave superconductor with long-range hopping and pairing amplitudes. New topological phases and quasiparticles different from the usual short-range model are obtained. When both hopping and pairing terms decay with the same exponent, one of the topological chiral phases with propagating Majorana edge states gets significantly enhanced by long-range couplings. On the other hand, when the long-range pairing amplitude decays more slowly than the hopping, we discover new topological phases where propagating Majorana fermions at each edge pair nonlocally and become gapped even in the thermodynamic limit. Remarkably, these nonlocal edge states are still robust, remain separated from the bulk, and are localized at both edges at the same time. The inclusion of long-range effects is potentially applicable to recent experiments with magnetic impurities and islands in 2D superconductors.