English

Pseudogap and zero-bias anomaly due to fluctuation suppression of quasiparticle tunneling

Superconductivity 2012-10-26 v2

Abstract

We study the effect of superconducting fluctuations on the tunnel current-voltage characteristics of disordered superconducting films placed in a perpendicular magnetic field, HH, in the whole HH-TT phase diagram outside the superconducting region. This tunnel-current is experimentally accessible by STM measurements. In the domain of temperatures TTc0T\geq T_{c0} and relatively weak fields HHc2(0)H\ll H_{c2}(0) we reproduce existing results for the zero-voltage tunneling conductance, but also discover an important nonlinear contribution, which appears due to dynamic fluctuation modes and results in the formation of a strong zero-bias anomaly (ZBA) on the scale eVkB(TTc0)eV\sim k_{\mathrm{B}}(T-T_{c0}). At large voltages (eVkBTc0eV\sim k_{\mathrm{B}}T_{c0}) these modes, together with the contribution from static fluctuations, form a pseudogap maximum. At low temperatures, with magnetic field values near Hc2(0)H_{c2}(0), fluctuations acquire quantum character and the general picture of the voltage dependent tunneling conductance resembles that one close to Tc0T_{c0}, where the role of temperature and magnetic field are exchanged. In particular, a gap-like structure appears with maximum at eVmaxΔBCSeV_{\max}\sim \Delta_{\mathrm{BCS}} and a sharp ZBA on the scale eVΔBCS(H/Hc2(0)1)eV\sim \Delta_{\mathrm{BCS}}(H/H_{c2}(0)-1). The complete expression for the tunneling current at arbitrary fields and temperatures can be evaluated only numerically, which is presented in detail.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1210.4206,
  title  = {Pseudogap and zero-bias anomaly due to fluctuation suppression of quasiparticle tunneling},
  author = {A. Glatz and A. A. Varlamov and V. M. Vinokur},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1210.4206},
  year   = {2012}
}

Comments

10 pages, 12 figures