We demonstrate that thermoelectric currents in superconducting bilayers with a spin-active interface are controlled by the two competing processes. On one hand, spin-sensitive quasiparticle scattering at such an interface generates an electron-hole imbalance and yields an orders-of-magnitude enhancement of the thermoelectric effect in the system. On the other hand, this electron-hole imbalance gets suppressed in the superconductor bulk due to electron scattering on nonmagnetic impurities. As a result, large thermoelectric currents can only flow in the vicinity of the spin-active interface and decay away from this interface at a distance exceeding the electron elastic mean free path $\ell$. The magnitude of the thermoelectric effect reaches its maximum provided $\ell$ becomes of order of the total bilayer thickness.

We investigate experimentally and theoretically the acoustic phonon propagation in two-dimensional phononic crystal membranes. Solid-air and solid-solid phononic crystals were made of square lattices of holes and Au pillars in and on 250 nm thick single crystalline Si membrane, respectively. The hypersonic phonon dispersion was investigated using Brillouin light scattering. Volume reduction (holes) or mass loading (pillars) accompanied with second-order periodicity and local resonances are shown to significantly modify the propagation of thermally activated GHz phonons. We use numerical modeling based on the finite element method to analyze the experimental results and determine polarization, symmetry, or three-dimensional localization of observed modes.

Oxide heterostructures with polar films display special electronic properties, such as the electronic reconstruction at their internal interfaces with the formation of two-dimensional metallic states. Moreover, the electrical field from the polar layers is inversion-symmetry breaking and generates a Rashba spin-orbit coupling (RSOC) in the interfacial electronic system. We investigate the quantum capacitance of a heterostructure in which a sizable RSOC at a metallic interface is controlled by the electric field of a surface electrode. Such a structure is, for example, given by a ${\text{LaAlO}}_3$ film on a ${\text{SrTiO}}_3$ substrate which is gated by a top electrode. Such heterostructures can exhibit a strong enhancement of their capacitance [Li et al., Science 332, 825 (2011)]. The capacitance is related to the electronic compressibility of the heterostructure, but the two quantities are not equivalent. In fact, the transfer of charge to the interface controls the relation between capacitance and compressibility. We find that, due to a strong RSOC, the quantum capacitance can be larger than the classical geometric value. However, in contrast to the results of recent investigations [Caprara et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 109, 196401 (2012);Bucheli et al., Phys. Rev. B 89, 195448 (2014); Seibold et al., Europhys. Lett. 109, 17006 (2015)], the compressibility does not become negative for realistic parameter values for ${\text{LaAlO}}_3/{\text{SrTiO}}_3$ and, therefore, we find that no phase-separated state is induced by the strong RSOC at these interfaces.

Angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES) is typically used to study only the occupied electronic band structure of a material. Here we use laser-based ARPES to observe a feature in bismuth-based superconductors that, in contrast, is related to the unoccupied states. Specifically, we observe a dispersive suppression of intensity cutting across the valence band, which, when compared with relativistic one-step calculations, can be traced to two final-state gaps in the bands 6 eV above the Fermi level. This finding opens up possibilities to bring the ultrahigh momentum resolution of existing laser-ARPES instruments to the unoccupied electron states. For cases where the final-state gap is not the object of study, we find that its effects can be made to vanish under certain experimental conditions.

We study, theoretically and numerically, the onset and development of modulational instability in an incoherently pumped spatially homogeneous polariton condensate. Within the framework of mean-field theory, we identify regimes of modulational instability in two cases: (1) strong feedback between the condensate and reservoir, which may occur in scalar condensates, and (2) parametric scattering in the presence of polarization splitting in spinor condensates. In both cases we investigate the instability-induced textures in space and time including nonequilibrium dynamics of phase dislocations and vortices. In particular we discuss the mechanism of vortex destabilization and formation of spiraling waves. We also identify the presence of topological defects, which take the form of half-vortex pairs in the spinor case, giving an “eyelet” structure in intensity and dipole-type structure in the spin polarization. In the modulationally stable parameter domains, we observe formation of the phase defects in the process of condensate formation from an initially spatially incoherent low-density state. In analogy to the Kibble-Zurek-type scaling for nonequilibrium phase transitions, we find that the defect density scales with the pumping rate.

The ${\mathrm{Al}}_5{\mathrm{Co}}_2$ crystal is a complex intermetallic compound, whose structure can be described by a stacking of chemically bonded atomic motifs. It is a potentially new catalytic material for heterogeneous hydrogenation. A single crystal of this phase has been grown by the Czochralski technique in order to study the influence of the three-dimensional bulk substructure on the two-dimensional surface using both experimental ultrahigh vacuum surface techniques and ab initio methods based on the density functional theory. Some bulk properties are first presented, focusing on chemical bond strengths, the determination of the Al and Co chemical potentials in ${\mathrm{Al}}_5{\mathrm{Co}}_2$, the vibrational properties, and the specific heat. Then, the combination of experimental and computational approaches allows the identification of the surface structure, which was found to depend on the surface preparation conditions. In all cases, the surface terminates at specific bulk layers (Al-rich puckered layers) where various fractions of specific sets of Al atoms are missing, identified as ${\mathrm{Al}}_3$ atoms left at the surface resulting from cluster truncation. Finally, electron density of states calculations and spectroscopic measurements were compared and indicate a strong $sp\text{−}d$ hybridization of the topmost pure Al layer with subsurface Co atoms. This could influence the surface reactivity and the catalytic performances of this material.

We introduce the cluster-expansion ghost-lattice method, which extends the applicability of existing cluster-expansion software, to cluster expand structures of arbitrary finite and infinite geometries in a fast, unique, and transferable way. The ghost site that is introduced zeroes the cluster function of any cluster which includes it. This enables the use of bulk clusters grouped by bulk symmetries in nonbulk systems and distinguishes the cluster-expansion ghost-lattice method from a regular ternary cluster expansion with an inactive vacuum atom type. Even though the method does not treat surface terms, it can be used as an efficient way to obtain the bulk term in D. Lerch et al. [Modell. Simul. Mater. Sci. Eng. 17, 055003 (2009)]. We use the method to learn the thermal conductivity of Si-Ge nanowires, oriented along the [111] direction on a diamond lattice, versus their configuration of Si and Ge atoms. Once learned, the ghost-lattice cluster-expansion method is shown to be able to predict the lowest-thermal-conductivity nanowire configuration, in agreement with the configuration found in M. Chan et al. [Phys. Rev. B 81, 174303 (2010)].

We present results of a study of the antiferromagnetic spin-1 chain, subject to the simultaneous presence of single-ion anisotropy and external magnetic fields. Using a quantum Monte Carlo calculation based on the stochastic series expansion method, we first uncover a rich quantum phase diagram comprising Néel, Haldane, Luttinger-liquid, and large-anisotropy phases. Second, we scan across this phase diagram over a wide range of parameters, evaluating the transverse dynamic structure factor, which we show to exhibit sharp massive modes as well as multiparticle continua. For vanishing anisotropy and fields, comparison with existing results from other analytic and numerical approaches shows convincing consistency.

We explore and construct a class of bosonic short-range entangled (BSRE) states in all $4k+2$ spatial dimensions, which are higher dimensional generalizations of the well-known Kitaev's $E_8$ state in $2d$ [Ann. Phys. (N.Y.) 321, 2 (2006); http://online.kitp.ucsb.edu/online/topomat11/kitaev]. These BSRE states share the following properties: (1) their bulk is fully gapped and nondegenerate; (2) their $(4k+1)d$ boundary is described by a “self-dual” rank-$2k$ antisymmetric tensor gauge field, and it is guaranteed to be gapless without assuming any symmetry; (3) their $(4k+1)d$ boundary has intrinsic gravitational anomaly once coupled to the gravitational field; (4) their bulk is described by an effective Chern-Simons field theory with rank-$(2k+1)$ antisymmetric tensor fields, whose $K^{IJ}$ matrix is identical to that of the $E_8$ state in $2d$; (5) the existence of these BSRE states leads to various bosonic symmetry protected topological (BSPT) states as their descendants in other dimensions; (6) these BSRE states can be constructed by confining fermionic degrees of freedom from eight copies of $(4k+2)d$ SRE states with fermionic $2k\text{−}\mathrm{branes}$; (7) after compactifying the $(4k+2)d$ BSRE state on a closed $4k$ dimensional manifold, depending on the topology of the compact $4k$ manifold, the system could reduce to nontrivial $2d$ BSRE states.

We analyze the equilibrium micromagnetic domain wall structures encountered in Permalloy strips of a wide range of thicknesses and widths, with strip widths up to several micrometers. By performing an extensive set of micromagnetic simulations, we show that the equilibrium phase diagram of the domain wall structures exhibits in addition to the previously found structures (symmetric and asymmetric transverse walls, vortex wall) also double vortex and triple vortex domain walls for large enough strip widths and thicknesses. Also several metastable domain wall structures are found for wide and/or thick strips. We discuss the details of the relaxation process from random magnetization initial states towards the stable domain wall structure and show that our results are robust with respect to changes of, e.g., the magnitude of the Gilbert damping constant and details of the initial conditions.

We use magnetic force microscopy (MFM) to characterize superconductivity across the superconducting dome in $\mathrm{BaF}{\mathrm{e}}_2{\left(\mathrm{A}{\mathrm{s}}_{1-x}{\mathrm{P}}_x\right)}_2$, a pnictide with a peak in the penetration depth $\left({\lambda }_{ab}\right)$ at optimal doping $\left(x_{\mathrm{opt}}\right)$, as shown in sample-wide measurements. Our local measurements show a peak at $x_{\mathrm{opt}}$ and a $T_C$ vs ${\lambda }_{ab}^{-2}$ dependence similar on both sides of $x_{\mathrm{opt}}$. Near the underdoped edge of the dome ${\lambda }_{ab}$ increases sharply, suggesting that superconductivity competes with another phase. Indeed, MFM vortex imaging shows correlated defects parallel to twin boundaries only in underdoped samples and not for $x\ge x_{\mathrm{opt}}$.

We propose to construct large quantum graph codes by means of superconducting circuits working at the ultrastrong coupling regime. In this physical scenario, we are able to create a cluster state between any pair of qubits within a fraction of a nanosecond. To exemplify our proposal, creation of the five-qubit and Steane codes is numerically simulated. We also provide optimal operating conditions with which the graph codes can be realized with state-of-the-art superconducting technologies.

We show that a first-order phase transition can take place in a metal in a strong magnetic field if an electron Landau level approaches the Fermi energy of the metal. This transition is due to the electron-phonon interaction and is characterized by a jump in magnetostriction of the metal. If there are several equivalent groups of charge carriers in the metal, a spontaneous symmetry breaking of the magnetostriction can occur when the Landau level crosses the Fermi energy, and this breaking manifests itself as a series of the structural phase transitions that change a crystal symmetry of the metal. With these results, we discuss unusual findings recently discovered in bismuth.

We study in-gap electronic states induced by a nonmagnetic defect with short-range potential in two-dimensional topological insulators and trace their evolution as the distance between the defect and the boundary changes. The defect located far from the boundary is found to produce two bound states independently of the sign of its potential. The states are classified as electronlike and holelike. Each of these states can have two types of spatial distribution of the electron density. The first-type states have a maximum of the density in the center and the second-type ones have a minimum. When the defect is coupled with the boundary, the bound states are transformed correspondingly into resonances of two types and take up the form of the edge states flowing around the defect. Under certain conditions, two resonances interfere, giving rise to the formation of a bound state embedded into the continuum spectrum of the edge states flowing around the defect. We calculate the spatial distribution of the electron density in the edge states flowing around the defect and estimate the charge accumulated near the defect. The current density field of the edge states flowing around the defect contains two components, one of which flows around the defect and the other circulates around it.

We demonstrate the emission of highly indistinguishable photons from a quasi-resonantly pumped coupled quantum dot–microcavity system operating in the regime of cavity quantum electrodynamics. Changing the sample temperature allows us to vary the quantum dot–cavity detuning and, on spectral resonance, we observe a threefold improvement in the Hong-Ou-Mandel interference visibility, reaching values in excess of 80%. Our measurements off-resonance allow us to investigate varying Purcell enhancements, and to probe the dephasing environment at different temperatures and energy scales. By comparison with our microscopic model, we are able to identify pure dephasing and not time jitter as the dominating source of imperfections in our system.

It has been shown recently that in spin precession experiments, the interaction of spins with localized states can change the response to a magnetic field, leading to a modified, effective spin relaxation time and precession frequency. Here, we show that also the shape of the Hanle curve can change, so that it cannot be fitted with the solutions of the conventional Bloch equation. We present experimental data that show such an effect arising at low temperatures in epitaxial graphene on silicon carbide with localized states in the carbon buffer layer. We compare the effect between materials made with different growth methods, epitaxial growth by sublimation and by chemical vapor deposition. The presented analysis gives information about the density of localized states and their coupling to the graphene states, which is inaccessible by charge transport measurements and can be applied to any spin transport channel that is coupled to localized states.

We have used ion irradiation to damage the (001) surfaces of ${\text{SmB}}_6$ single crystals to varying depths, and have measured the resistivity as a function of temperature for each depth of damage. We observe a reduction in the residual resistivity with increasing depth of damage. Our data are consistent with a model in which the surface state is not destroyed by the ion irradiation, but instead the damaged layer is poorly conducting and the initial surface state is reconstructed below the damage. This behavior is consistent with a surface state that is topologically protected.

We study the two-band Hubbard model in infinite dimensions by solving the dynamical mean-field equations with a strong coupling continuous-time quantum Monte Carlo method and show that an $s$-wave superconducting state can be stabilized in the repulsively interacting case. We discuss how this superconducting state competes with the metallic and paired Mott states. The effects of the Hund coupling and crystalline electric field are also addressed.

The question whether excess electrons in ${\mathrm{SrTiO}}_3$ form free or trapped carriers is a crucial aspect for the electronic properties of this important material. This fundamental ambiguity prevents a consistent interpretation of the puzzling experimental situation, where results support one or the other scenario depending on the type of experiment that is conducted. Using density functional theory with an on-site Coulomb interaction U, we show that excess electrons form small polarons if the density of electronic carriers is higher than $\approx {10}^{20}{\mathrm{cm}}^{-3}$. Below this value, the electrons stay delocalized or become large polarons. For oxygen-deficient ${\mathrm{SrTiO}}_3$, small polarons confined to ${\mathrm{Ti}}^{3+}$ sites are immobile at low temperature but can be thermally activated into a conductive state, which explains the metal-insulator transition observed experimentally.