CCNY Physics Colloquium- Jay Sau (University of Maryland, College Park), Date 09/23/2020

Search for Non-Abelian Majorana particles as a route to topological quantum computation

Abstract: Majorana zero modes are fermion-like excitations that were originally proposed in particle physics by Ettore Majorana
and are characterized as being their own anti-particle. In condensed matter systems, Majorana zero modes occur as fractionalized
excitations with an associated topologically protected degeneracy. For over a decade the only candidate
systems for observing Majorana zero modes were the non-Abelian fractional quantum Hall state and chiral p-wave superconductors.
In this talk, I will discuss a set of proposals for realizing Majorana zero modes in a large class of spin-orbit coupled,
time-reversal symmetry broken superconducting systems. The simplicity of this class of systems has resulted in several experimental
attempts, which have successfully observed preliminary evidence for the Majorana zero modes in the form of zero-bias conductance
peaks and the fractional Josephson effect. Following this I will review recent experimental progress on spin-orbit coupled
superconductors. I will end by describing what a topological quantum computer based on Majorana modes might look like in the future.

Видео CCNY Physics Colloquium- Jay Sau (University of Maryland, College Park), Date 09/23/2020 канала CCNY Physics