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  • Letter
  • Open Access

Negative hybridization: A potential cure for braiding with imperfect Majorana modes

Cole Peeters, Themba Hodge, and Stephan Rachel

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Phys. Rev. Research 8, L032032 – Published 27 August, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/fqyv-r35f

Abstract

Majorana zero modes, the elementary building blocks for the quantum bits of topological quantum computers, are known to suffer from hybridization as their wavefunctions begin to overlap. This breaks the ground-state degeneracy, splitting their energy levels and leading to an accumulation of error when performing topological quantum gates. Here, we show that the energy splitting of the Majorana zero modes can become negative, which can be utilized to reduce the average hybridization energy of the total gate. We present two illustrative examples where negative hybridization suppresses gate errors to such an extent that they remain below the fault-tolerance threshold. As an intrinsic property of Majorana zero modes, negative hybridization enables systems based on imperfect Majorana zero modes to regain functionality for quantum information processing.

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Phys. Rev. Research 8, L032032– Published 27 August, 2026
  • Received 27 January 2026
  • Accepted 8 August 2026
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

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