Strong magnetic field induces superconductivity in a Weyl semimetal

Baruch Rosenstein, B. Ya Shapiro, Dingping Li, I. Shapiro

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

10 Scopus citations

Abstract

Microscopic theory of the normal-to-superconductor coexistence line of a multiband Weyl superconductor subjected to magnetic field is constructed. It is shown that the Weyl semimetal that is nonsuperconducting or having a small critical temperature Tc at zero field might become a superconductor at higher temperatures when the magnetic field is tuned to a series of quantized values Hn. The pairing occurs on Landau levels. It is argued that the phenomenon is detectable much easier in Weyl semimetals than in parabolic band metals since the quantum limit already has been approached in several Weyl materials. The effect of Zeeman coupling leading to splitting of the reentrant superconducting regions on the magnetic phase diagram is considered. An experimental signature of the superconductivity on Landau levels is the reduction of magnetoresistivity. This has been observed already in Cd3As2 and several other compounds. The novel kind of quantum oscillations of magnetoresistance detected in ZrTe5 is discussed along these lines.

Original languageEnglish
Article number224517
JournalPhysical Review B
Volume96
Issue number22
DOIs
StatePublished - 29 Dec 2017

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2017 American Physical Society.

Funding

We are grateful to N. L. Wang, T. Maniv, T. W. Luo, V. Vinokur, J. Wang, and C. Hou, for valuable discussions. B.R. acknowledges MOST of ROC Grant No. 103-2112-M-009-009-MY3 hospitality of Peking and Bar Ilan Universities. D.P.L. was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants No. 11274018 and No. 11674007). We are grateful to N. L. Wang, T. Maniv, T. W. Luo, V. Vinokur, J. Wang, and C. Hou, for valuable discussions. B.R. acknowledges MOST of ROC Grant No. 103-2112-M-009-009-MY3 hospitality of Peking and Bar Ilan Universities. D.P.L. was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grants No. 11274018 and No. 11674007).

FundersFunder number
Peking and Bar Ilan Universities
National Natural Science Foundation of China11274018, 11674007
Ministry of Science and Technology of the People's Republic of China
Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan103-2112-M-009-009-MY3

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