Tuning Ising superconductivity with layer and spin-orbit coupling in two-dimensional transition-metal dichalcogenides

TL;DR

This study explores how layer thickness and spin-orbit coupling influence superconductivity in monolayer transition-metal dichalcogenides, revealing enhanced critical fields and potential for unconventional states.

Contribution

It provides the first experimental investigation of superconducting properties in monolayer TaS₂, demonstrating the dominance of spin-orbit coupling in enhancing critical fields.

Findings

Largest upper critical field reported for an intrinsic TMD superconductor.

Enhanced critical field persists in few-layer samples due to spin-orbit coupling.

Monolayer TaS₂ shows potential for unconventional superconducting states.

Abstract

Systems that simultaneously exhibit superconductivity and spin-orbit coupling are predicted to provide a route toward topological superconductivity and unconventional electron pairing, driving significant contemporary interest in these materials. Monolayer transition-metal dichalcogenide (TMD) superconductors in particular lack inversion symmetry, enforcing a spin-triplet component of the superconducting wavefunction that increases with the strength of spin-orbit coupling. In this work, we present an experimental and theoretical study of two intrinsic TMD superconductors with large spin-orbit coupling in the atomic layer limit, metallic 2H-TaS$_2$ and 2H-NbSe$_2$. For the first time in TaS$_2$, we investigate the superconducting properties as the material is reduced to a monolayer and show that high-field measurements point to the largest upper critical field thus reported for an intrinsic TMD superconductor. In few-layer samples, we find that the enhancement of the upper critical field is sustained by the dominance of spin-orbit coupling over weak interlayer coupling, providing additional platforms for unconventional superconducting states in two dimensions.