Lifting the Franck-Condon blockade in driven quantum dots

in Physical Review. B, Condensed Matter (2016), 94

Electron-vibron coupling in quantum dots can lead to a strong suppression of the average current in the sequential tunneling regime. This effect is known as Franck-Condon blockade and can be traced back ... [more ▼]

Electron-vibron coupling in quantum dots can lead to a strong suppression of the average current in the sequential tunneling regime. This effect is known as Franck-Condon blockade and can be traced back to an overlap integral between vibron states with different electron numbers which becomes exponentially small for large electron-vibron coupling strength. Here, we investigate the effect of a time-dependent drive on this phenomenon, in particular the effect of an oscillatory gate voltage acting on the electronic dot level. We employ two different approaches: perturbation theory based on nonequilibrium Keldysh Green's functions and a master equation in Born-Markov approximation. In both cases, we find that the drive can lift the blockade by exciting vibrons. As a consequence, the relative change in average current grows exponentially with the drive strength. [less ▲]

Detecting nonlocal Cooper pair entanglement by optical Bell inequality violation

in Physical Review. B, Condensed Matter (2015), 91

Based on the Bardeen Cooper Schrieffer (BCS) theory of superconductivity, the coherent splitting of Cooper pairs from a superconductor to two spatially separated quantum dots has been predicted to ... [more ▼]

Based on the Bardeen Cooper Schrieffer (BCS) theory of superconductivity, the coherent splitting of Cooper pairs from a superconductor to two spatially separated quantum dots has been predicted to generate nonlocal pairs of entangled electrons. In order to test this hypothesis, we propose a scheme to transfer the spin state of a split Cooper pair onto the polarization state of a pair of optical photons. We show that the produced photon pairs can be used to violate a Bell inequality, unambiguously demonstrating the entanglement of the split Cooper pairs. [less ▲]

Detecting Majorana bound states by nanomechanics

in Physical Review. B (2011), 84

We propose a nanomechanical detection scheme for Majorana bound states, which have been predicted to exist at the edges of a one-dimensional topological superconductor, implemented, for instance, using a ... [more ▼]

We propose a nanomechanical detection scheme for Majorana bound states, which have been predicted to exist at the edges of a one-dimensional topological superconductor, implemented, for instance, using a semiconducting wire placed on top of an s-wave superconductor. The detector makes use of an oscillating electrode, which can be realized using a doubly clamped metallic beam, tunnel coupled to one edge of the topological superconductor. We find that a measurement of the nonlinear differential conductance provides the necessary information to uniquely identify Majorana bound states. [less ▲]