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Main Authors: Thomas, Anoop, Devaux, Eloïse, Nagarajan, Kalaivanan, Chervy, Thibault, Seidel, Marcus, Hagenmüller, David, Schütz, Stefan, Schachenmayer, Johannes, Genet, Cyriaque, Pupillo, Guido, Ebbesen, Thomas W.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2019
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Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/1911.01459
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author Thomas, Anoop
Devaux, Eloïse
Nagarajan, Kalaivanan
Chervy, Thibault
Seidel, Marcus
Hagenmüller, David
Schütz, Stefan
Schachenmayer, Johannes
Genet, Cyriaque
Pupillo, Guido
Ebbesen, Thomas W.
author_facet Thomas, Anoop
Devaux, Eloïse
Nagarajan, Kalaivanan
Chervy, Thibault
Seidel, Marcus
Hagenmüller, David
Schütz, Stefan
Schachenmayer, Johannes
Genet, Cyriaque
Pupillo, Guido
Ebbesen, Thomas W.
contents Light-matter interactions have generated considerable interest as a means to manipulate material properties. Light-induced superconductivity has been demonstrated using pulsed lasers. An attractive alternative possibility is to exploit strong light-matter interactions arising by coupling phonons to the vacuum electromagnetic field of a cavity mode as has been suggested and theoretically studied. Here we explore this possibility for two very different superconductors, namely YBCO (YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{6+x}$) and Rb$_3$C$_{60}$, coupled to surface plasmon polaritons, using a novel cooperative effect based on the presence of a strongly coupled vibrational environment allowing efficient dressing of the otherwise weakly coupled phonon bands of these compounds. By placing the superconductor-surface plasmon system in a SQUID magnetometer, we find that the superconducting transition temperatures ($T_{c}$) for both compounds are modified in the absence of any external laser field. For YBCO, $T_{c}$ decreases from 92 K to 86 K while for Rb$_3$C$_{60}$, it increases from 30 K to 45 K at normal pressures. In the latter case, a simple theoretical framework is provided to understand these results based on an enhancement of the electron-phonon coupling. This proof-of-principle study opens a new tool box to not only modify superconducting materials but also to understand the mechanistic details of different superconductors.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_1911_01459
institution arXiv
publishDate 2019
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Exploring Superconductivity under Strong Coupling with the Vacuum Electromagnetic Field
Thomas, Anoop
Devaux, Eloïse
Nagarajan, Kalaivanan
Chervy, Thibault
Seidel, Marcus
Hagenmüller, David
Schütz, Stefan
Schachenmayer, Johannes
Genet, Cyriaque
Pupillo, Guido
Ebbesen, Thomas W.
Superconductivity
Quantum Physics
Light-matter interactions have generated considerable interest as a means to manipulate material properties. Light-induced superconductivity has been demonstrated using pulsed lasers. An attractive alternative possibility is to exploit strong light-matter interactions arising by coupling phonons to the vacuum electromagnetic field of a cavity mode as has been suggested and theoretically studied. Here we explore this possibility for two very different superconductors, namely YBCO (YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{6+x}$) and Rb$_3$C$_{60}$, coupled to surface plasmon polaritons, using a novel cooperative effect based on the presence of a strongly coupled vibrational environment allowing efficient dressing of the otherwise weakly coupled phonon bands of these compounds. By placing the superconductor-surface plasmon system in a SQUID magnetometer, we find that the superconducting transition temperatures ($T_{c}$) for both compounds are modified in the absence of any external laser field. For YBCO, $T_{c}$ decreases from 92 K to 86 K while for Rb$_3$C$_{60}$, it increases from 30 K to 45 K at normal pressures. In the latter case, a simple theoretical framework is provided to understand these results based on an enhancement of the electron-phonon coupling. This proof-of-principle study opens a new tool box to not only modify superconducting materials but also to understand the mechanistic details of different superconductors.
title Exploring Superconductivity under Strong Coupling with the Vacuum Electromagnetic Field
topic Superconductivity
Quantum Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/1911.01459