Non-local Tunneling Spectroscopy of Inelastic Quasiparticle Relaxation in Superconducting 1-D Wires

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Ryan, Kevin M., Beckmann, Detlef, Chandrasekhar, Venkat
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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author Ryan, Kevin M.
Beckmann, Detlef
Chandrasekhar, Venkat
author_facet Ryan, Kevin M.
Beckmann, Detlef
Chandrasekhar, Venkat
contents Non-local conductance experiments using tunnel junctions can provide valuable spectroscopic information on both the transport and relaxation of quasiparticles in superconductors, as these techniques directly probe the quasiparticle charge and energy imbalance even at mK temperatures. In this work, we employ mesoscopic three terminal Cu and Al NIS devices to study non-local quasiparticle transport over length-scales on the order of the superconducting coherence length in this regime. Via a dual-bias scheme, which utilizes detector biases both above and below the superconducting gap, we are able to extract the effect of quasiparticle energy imbalance via its impact on the self consistent pair potential by symmetry considerations. We observe non-local conductance features due to pair-breaking which are anti-symmetric with respect to the polarity of the voltage bias, with a sharp onset during single electron tunneling at energies around $3Δ$. We compare these findings with quasiclassical simulations including inelastic effects to obtain estimates of the energy dependent inelastic scattering time. In addition, we demonstrate kinetic effects due to a large applied supercurrent which can also be captured in this formalism and decomposed with respect to the particle-hole symmetry and supercurrent direction, and discuss further opportunities for the advancement of this method.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2604_26862
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publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Non-local Tunneling Spectroscopy of Inelastic Quasiparticle Relaxation in Superconducting 1-D Wires
Ryan, Kevin M.
Beckmann, Detlef
Chandrasekhar, Venkat
Superconductivity
Quantum Physics
Non-local conductance experiments using tunnel junctions can provide valuable spectroscopic information on both the transport and relaxation of quasiparticles in superconductors, as these techniques directly probe the quasiparticle charge and energy imbalance even at mK temperatures. In this work, we employ mesoscopic three terminal Cu and Al NIS devices to study non-local quasiparticle transport over length-scales on the order of the superconducting coherence length in this regime. Via a dual-bias scheme, which utilizes detector biases both above and below the superconducting gap, we are able to extract the effect of quasiparticle energy imbalance via its impact on the self consistent pair potential by symmetry considerations. We observe non-local conductance features due to pair-breaking which are anti-symmetric with respect to the polarity of the voltage bias, with a sharp onset during single electron tunneling at energies around $3Δ$. We compare these findings with quasiclassical simulations including inelastic effects to obtain estimates of the energy dependent inelastic scattering time. In addition, we demonstrate kinetic effects due to a large applied supercurrent which can also be captured in this formalism and decomposed with respect to the particle-hole symmetry and supercurrent direction, and discuss further opportunities for the advancement of this method.
title Non-local Tunneling Spectroscopy of Inelastic Quasiparticle Relaxation in Superconducting 1-D Wires
topic Superconductivity
Quantum Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.26862