English

Magnetically Induced Switching-Current Jumps in InAs/Al Josephson Junctions

Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics 2026-04-01 v1 Superconductivity

Abstract

We report Barkhausen-like switching at millitesla fields in an nn-doped InAs/Al nanowire Josephson junction, which serves as an interferometric probe of intrinsic magnetic reconfigurations, as evidenced by discrete switching-current jumps. At T=30T=30~mK the device displays a Fraunhofer-like modulation with Isw(0)0.24 μAI_{\mathrm{sw}}(0)\approx 0.24~\mu\mathrm{A} and an abrupt transition at B3 mT|B|\approx 3~\mathrm{mT} between two branches differing by ΔIsw0.13 μA\Delta I_{\mathrm{sw}}\approx 0.13~\mu\mathrm{A}. By tracking the characteristic field scales from 3030 to 900900~mK, we find that the jump field is essentially temperature-independent, whereas the superconducting critical field decreases with temperature, as expected for thin Al films. The sharp discontinuity, sweep-direction asymmetry, and reproducibility across repeated scans point to avalanche-like switching between metastable magnetic configurations of the local magnetic texture, which are directly coupled to the weak link. Within an effective-field framework, each reconfiguration modifies a local field offset, thereby reshaping the interference response and leading to an abrupt reorganization of the switching-current pattern.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2603.29757,
  title  = {Magnetically Induced Switching-Current Jumps in InAs/Al Josephson Junctions},
  author = {Ofelia Durante and Roberta Citro and Elia Strambini and Valeria Demontis and Mirko Rocci and Alessandro Braggio and Sergio Battiato and Valentina Zannier and Lucia Sorba and Francesco Giazotto and Claudio Guarcello},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2603.29757},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

Main text: 9 pages, 4 figure. Supporting Information: 10 pages, 5 figures

R2 v1 2026-07-01T11:46:17.807Z