Recent theoretical work highlighted the unique properties of superconducting altermagnets, including the wealth of topologically nontrivial phases as well as their potential uses in spintronic applications. Given that no intrinsically superconducting altermagnets have yet been discovered, we study here the possibility of superconducting order induced by the proximity effect from a conventional $s$-wave superconductor. Through symmetry analysis and microscopic modeling we find that interesting superconducting phases can indeed be proximity induced in a thin altermagnetic film provided that weak Rashba spin-orbit coupling is present at the interface. Surprisingly, the resulting superconductor is generically nodal with a mixed singlet/triplet order parameter and, importantly for applications, capable of generating spin-polarized persistent current. We propose a set of candidate heterostructures with low lattice mismatch suitable to probe these effects experimentally.

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• Magnetism
• Proximity effect
• Spin-triplet pairing
• Spintronics
• Topological materials
• Topological superconductors