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Spin-Orbit Enhanced Superconductivity in Bernal Bilayer Graphene

Superconductivity 2023-03-13 v1 Materials Science Strongly Correlated Electrons

Abstract

In the presence of a large perpendicular electric field, Bernal-stacked bilayer graphene (BLG) features several broken-symmetry metallic phases as well as magnetic-field-induced superconductivity. The superconducting state is quite fragile, however, appearing only in a narrow window of density and with a maximum critical temperature Tc30T_c\approx30~mK. Here, we show that placing monolayer tungsten diselenide (WSe2_{2}) on BLG promotes Cooper pairing to an extraordinary degree: superconductivity appears at zero magnetic field, exhibits an order of magnitude enhancement in TcT_c, and occurs over a density range that is wider by a factor of eight. By mapping quantum oscillations in BLG-WSe2_2 as a function of electric field and doping, we establish that superconductivity emerges throughout a region whose normal state is polarized, with two out of four spin-valley flavours predominantly populated. In-plane magnetic field measurements further reveal a striking dependence of the critical field on doping, with the Chandrasekhar-Clogston (Pauli) limit roughly obeyed on one end of the superconducting dome yet sharply violated on the other. Moreover, the superconductivity arises only for perpendicular electric fields that push BLG hole wavefunctions towards WSe2_2 -- suggesting that proximity-induced (Ising) spin-orbit coupling plays a key role in enhancing the pairing. Our results pave the way for engineering robust, highly tunable, and ultra-clean graphene-based superconductors.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2205.05087,
  title  = {Spin-Orbit Enhanced Superconductivity in Bernal Bilayer Graphene},
  author = {Yiran Zhang and Robert Polski and Alex Thomson and Étienne Lantagne-Hurtubise and Cyprian Lewandowski and Haoxin Zhou and Kenji Watanabe and Takashi Taniguchi and Jason Alicea and Stevan Nadj-Perge},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2205.05087},
  year   = {2023}
}

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