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Journal of Experimental and Theoretical Physics

Andreev bound states. Some quasiclassical reflections

Yiruo Lin, A. J. Leggett

Published Dec 1, 2014• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We discuss a very simple and essentially exactly solvable model problem which illustrates some nice features of Andreev bound states, namely, the trapping of a single Bogoliubov quasiparticle in a neutral s -wave BCS superfluid by a wide and shallow Zeeman trap. In the quasiclassical limit, the ground state is a doublet with a splitting which is proportional to the exponentially small amplitude for “normal” reflection by the edges of the trap. We comment briefly on a prima facie paradox concerning the continuity equation and conjecture a resolution to it.

DOI
10.1134/s1063776114120139

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We discuss a very simple and essentially exactly solvable model problem which illustrates some nice features of Andreev bound states, namely, the trapping of a single Bogoliubov quasiparticle in a neutral s -wave BCS superfluid by a wide and shallow Zeeman trap. In the quasiclassical limit, the ground state is a doublet with a splitting which is proportional to the exponentially small amplitude for “normal” reflection by the edges of the trap. We comment briefly on a prima facie paradox concerning the continuity equation and conjecture a resolution to it.
We apply the formulation developed in a recent paper [Y. Ohashi and A. Griffin, Phys. Rev. A 72, 013601 (2005)] for single-particle excitations in the BCS-BEC crossover to the case of a broad Feshbach resonance. At T=0T=0T=0, we solve the Bogoliubov--de Gennes coupled equations taking into account a Bose condensate of bound states (molecules). In the case of a broad resonance, the density profile n(r)n(r)n(r), as well as the profile of the superfluid order parameter $\stackrel{\ifmmode \tilde{}\else \~{}\fi{}}{\ensuremath{\Delta}}(r)$, are spatially spread out to the Thomas-Fermi radius, even in the crossover region. This order parameter $\stackrel{\ifmmode \tilde{}\else \~{}\fi{}}{\ensuremath{\Delta}}(r)$ suppresses the effects of low-energy Andreev bound states on the rf tunneling current. As a result, the peak energy in the rf spectrum is found to occur at an energy equal to the superfluid order parameter $\stackrel{\ifmmode \tilde{}\else \~{}\fi{}}{\ensuremath{\Delta}}(r=0)$ at the center of the trap, in contrast to the case of a narrow resonance, and in agreement with recent measurements. The local density approximation is found to give a good approximation for the rf-tunneling spectrum.
A hydrodynamic description is used to study the normal modes of a vortex in a zero-temperature Bose-Einstein condensate. In the Thomas-Fermi limit, the circulating superfluid velocity far from the vortex core provides a small perturbation that splits the originally degenerate normal modes of a vortex-free condensate. The relative frequency shifts are small in all cases considered (they vanish for the lowest dipole mode with ∣m∣=1|m|=1∣m∣=1), suggesting that the vortex is stable. The Bogoliubov equations serve to verify the existence of helical waves, similar to those of a vortex line in an unbounded weakly interacting Bose gas. In the large-condensate (small-core) limit, the condensate wave function reduces to that of a straight vortex in an unbounded condensate; the corresponding Bogoliubov equations have no bound-state solutions that are uniform along the symmetry axis and that decay exponentially far from the vortex core.
We study the bosonic analog of Andreev reflection at a normal-superfluid interface where the superfluid is a boson condensate. We model the normal region as a zone where nonlinear effects can be neglected. Against the background of a decaying condensate, we identify a novel contribution to the current of reflected atoms. The group velocity of this Andreev reflected component differs from that of the normally reflected one. For a three-dimensional planar or two-dimensional linear interface Andreev reflection is neither specular nor conjugate.
At low temperature, the concentration of quasiparticles observed in superconducting circuits far exceeds the predictions of microscopic BCS theory at equilibrium. As a source of dissipation, these excess quasiparticles degrade the performance of various devices. Therefore, understanding their dynamics, especially their recombination into Cooper pairs, is an active topic of current research. In disordered superconductors, spatial fluctuations in the superconducting gap can trap quasiparticles and modify their eigenspectrum. Since this spectrum plays a key role in quasiparticle dynamics, it must be carefully investigated. To this end, we introduce a toy model of a single trap. Specifically, we consider a shallow disk-shaped gap variation in a clean superconductor. Using a semiclassical approximation, we demonstrate the existence of multiple bound states and give the dependence of their number on the size and depth of the gap suppression. Extending our analysis beyond the semiclassical regime, in dimensions larger than one, we observe an infinite number of bound states very close to the gap edge, even for an arbitrarily small trap. These results deepen our understanding of trapped quasiparticles and may have important implications for their recombination in disordered superconductors.