Quasiparticle interference in doped topological insulators with nematic superconductivity

TL;DR

This paper provides a theoretical analysis of quasiparticle interference patterns in doped topological insulators with nematic superconductivity, revealing how nematic order influences observable interference features.

Contribution

It introduces a theoretical framework to understand quasiparticle interference in nematic superconducting topological insulators, highlighting the impact of nematic order on interference patterns.

Findings

Nematic order causes anisotropic quasiparticle interference patterns.

Interference patterns vary with bias voltage and nematic orientation.

Results align with existing experimental observations.

Abstract

We theoretically investigate quasiparticle interference in superconducting topological insulators with the nematic order parameter. This order parameter spontaneously breaks the rotational symmetry of the crystal. Such rotational symmetry breaking is visible in the quasiparticle interference picture both in coordinate and momentum spaces. For a small bias voltages quasiparticle interference incommensurate with the crystal symmetry and shows nematic behavior. If the bias voltage is comparable with the value of the order parameter interference picture is similar to the interference picture of the normal state. Interference patterns are sensitive to the orientation of the nematicity. We compare our results with the existing experimental data.