4.7 Article

Possible transport evidence for three-dimensional topological superconductivity in doped β-PdBi2

Journal

SCIENTIFIC REPORTS
Volume 9, Issue -, Pages -

Publisher

NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-019-48906-7

Keywords

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Funding

  1. State of Texas through the Texas Center for Superconductivity at University of Houston
  2. U.S. Air Force Office of Scientific Research [FA9550-15-1-0236]
  3. T.L.L. Temple Foundation
  4. John J. and Rebecca Moores Endowment
  5. Division of Research at the University of Houston
  6. College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics at the University of Houston
  7. NSF [DMR-1508644]
  8. Department of Physics at the University of Houston

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Interest in topological states of matter burgeoned over a decade ago with the theoretical prediction and experimental detection of topological insulators, especially in bulk three-dimensional insulators that can be tuned out of it by doping. Their superconducting counterpart, the fully-gapped three-dimensional time-reversal-invariant topological superconductors, have evaded discovery in bulk intrinsic superconductors so far. The recently discovered topological metal beta-PdBi2 is a unique candidate for tunable bulk topological superconductivity because of its intrinsic superconductivity and spin-orbit-coupling. In this work, we provide experimental transport signatures consistent with fully-gapped 3D time-reversal-invariant topological superconductivity in K-doped beta-PdBi2. In particular, we find signatures of odd-parity bulk superconductivity via upper-critical field and magnetization measurements-odd-parity pairing can be argued, given the band structure of beta-PdBi2, to result in 3D topological superconductivity. In addition, Andreev spectroscopy reveals surface states protected by time-reversal symmetry which might be possible evidence of Majorana surface states (Majorana cone). Moreover, we find that the undoped bulk system is a trivial superconductor. Thus, we discover beta-PdBi2 as a unique bulk material that, on doping, can potentially undergo an unprecedented topological quantum phase transition in the superconducting state.

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