DC-Current Induced Domain Wall in a Chiral p-Wave Superconductor

Thibaut Jonckheere (1, 2) , Takeo Kato (3)

1 CPT - Centre de Physique Théorique - UMR 7332
2 CPT - E6 Nanophysique
3 ISSP - Institute for Solid State Physics [Tokyo]

We study theoretically the impact of an applied DC-current on a mesoscopic chiral p-wave superconductor. Performing quasi-classical calculations on a two-dimensional system, with an external magnetic flux to generate a DC current, we show that the current can trigger a transition to a state with a domain wall between regions of different chiralities. The system shows an hysteretic behavior, as different domain wall configurations are possible for a given current. This domain wall creation mechanism can give new insights on recent experiments observing anomalous current variations in Sr 2 RuO 4 junctions.

Domaines: Systèmes mésoscopiques et effet Hall quantique [cond-mat.mes-hall]

Thibaut Jonckheere, Takeo Kato. DC-Current Induced Domain Wall in a Chiral p-Wave Superconductor. Journal of the Physical Society of Japan, 2018, 87 (9), pp.094705. ⟨10.7566/JPSJ.87.094705⟩. ⟨hal-01876147⟩