Purely even harmonic Josephson current due to crossed pair transmission across strongly spin-polarized materials

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Main Authors: Schulz, Niklas L., Nikolić, Danilo, Eschrig, Matthias
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Schulz, Niklas L.
Nikolić, Danilo
Eschrig, Matthias
author_facet Schulz, Niklas L.
Nikolić, Danilo
Eschrig, Matthias
contents We revisit the problem of the second harmonic generation in the current-phase relation across ferromagnetic bilayers placed between BCS superconductors. In particular, we consider a strongly spin-polarized metallic ferromagnet coupled to two superconducting leads via thin spin-active (left) and non-spin-active (right) insulating layers. The system is examined in the framework of the quasiclassical Green$^\prime$s function formalism, both in the ballistic (Eilenberger) and the diffusive (Usadel) limit. Strong spin polarization allows for neglecting short-range mixed-spin correlations, and the Josephson supercurrent across the ferromagnet is fully mediated by long-range equal-spin triplet correlations. Using a diagrammatic technique for ballistic propagators introduced in Refs. [1-3], we describe the relevant Andreev processes responsible for the effective conversion of two spin-singlet Cooper pairs in the superconductor into two $\uparrow\uparrow$ and $\downarrow\downarrow$ pairs in the ferromagnet. Contrary to the naive picture of direct conversion, we show that the lowest order process involves four Cooper pairs in the superconductor, among which three are incoming, and one is outgoing, giving rise to net charge transport of 4e across the non-spin-active interface. The self-consistent numerical treatment of the diffusive junction, typically more relevant in experiments, confirms this picture quantitatively.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2512_00177
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Purely even harmonic Josephson current due to crossed pair transmission across strongly spin-polarized materials
Schulz, Niklas L.
Nikolić, Danilo
Eschrig, Matthias
Superconductivity
Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics
We revisit the problem of the second harmonic generation in the current-phase relation across ferromagnetic bilayers placed between BCS superconductors. In particular, we consider a strongly spin-polarized metallic ferromagnet coupled to two superconducting leads via thin spin-active (left) and non-spin-active (right) insulating layers. The system is examined in the framework of the quasiclassical Green$^\prime$s function formalism, both in the ballistic (Eilenberger) and the diffusive (Usadel) limit. Strong spin polarization allows for neglecting short-range mixed-spin correlations, and the Josephson supercurrent across the ferromagnet is fully mediated by long-range equal-spin triplet correlations. Using a diagrammatic technique for ballistic propagators introduced in Refs. [1-3], we describe the relevant Andreev processes responsible for the effective conversion of two spin-singlet Cooper pairs in the superconductor into two $\uparrow\uparrow$ and $\downarrow\downarrow$ pairs in the ferromagnet. Contrary to the naive picture of direct conversion, we show that the lowest order process involves four Cooper pairs in the superconductor, among which three are incoming, and one is outgoing, giving rise to net charge transport of 4e across the non-spin-active interface. The self-consistent numerical treatment of the diffusive junction, typically more relevant in experiments, confirms this picture quantitatively.
title Purely even harmonic Josephson current due to crossed pair transmission across strongly spin-polarized materials
topic Superconductivity
Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.00177