Phase-Slip Lines and Anomalous Josephson Effects in a Tungsten Clusters-Topological Insulator Microbridge

TL;DR

This study demonstrates how phase-slip lines in a tungsten-cluster topological insulator heterostructure exhibit unique Josephson effects, revealing potential for topological superconductivity and novel microwave response behaviors.

Contribution

The paper introduces a new TI-SC heterostructure with phase-slip lines acting as Josephson junctions, and analyzes their unusual microwave response linked to topological properties.

Findings

Presence of phase-slip lines acting as Josephson junctions

Observation of missing first Shapiro step and wide second step

Theoretical link between microwave response and topological Josephson effects

Abstract

Superconducting topological systems formed by a strong 3D topological insulator (TI) in proximity to a conventional $s$-wave superconductor (SC) have been intensely studied as they may host Majorana zero modes. However, there are limited experimental realizations of TI-SC systems in which robust superconducting pairing is induced on the surface states of the TI and a topological superconducting state is established. Here, we fabricate a novel TI-SC system by depositing, via focused ion beam, tungsten (W) nanoscale clusters on the surface of TI Bi$_{0.91}$Sb$_{0.09}$. We find that the resulting heterostructure supports phase-slip lines that act as effective Josephson junctions. We probe the response of the system to microwave radiation. We find that for some ac frequencies, and powers, the resulting Shapiro steps' structure of the voltage-current characteristic exhibits a missing first step and an unexpectedly wide second Shapiro step. The theoretical analysis of the measurements shows that the unusual Shapiro response arises from the interplay between a static Josephson junction and a dynamic one, and allows us to identify the conditions under which the missing first step can be attributed to the topological nature of the Josephson junctions formed by the phase-slip lines. Our results suggest a new approach to induce superconductivity in a TI, a novel route to realizing highly-transparent topological Josephson junctions, and show how the response of superconducting systems to microwave radiation can be used to infer the dynamics of phase-slip lines.