English

Random-matrix theory of Andreev reflection from a topological superconductor

Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics 2015-03-17 v3

Abstract

We calculate the probability distribution of the Andreev reflection eigenvalues R_n at the Fermi level in the circular ensemble of random-matrix theory. Without spin-rotation symmetry, the statistics of the electrical conductance G depends on the topological quantum number Q of the superconductor. We show that this dependence is nonperturbative in the number N of scattering channels, by proving that the p-th cumulant of G is independent of Q for p<N/d (with d=2 or d=1 in the presence or in the absence of time-reversal symmetry). A large-N effect such as weak localization cannot, therefore, probe the topological quantum number. For small N we calculate the full distribution P(G) of the conductance and find qualitative differences in the topologically trivial and nontrivial phases.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1012.0932,
  title  = {Random-matrix theory of Andreev reflection from a topological superconductor},
  author = {C. W. J. Beenakker and J. P. Dahlhaus and M. Wimmer and A. R. Akhmerov},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1012.0932},
  year   = {2015}
}

Comments

13 pages, 4 figures (published version)

R2 v1 2026-06-21T16:53:31.048Z