Status of the Search for Majorana Fermions in Semiconductor Nanowires

Synopsis

Tunneling spectroscopy measurements on one-dimensional superconducting hybrid materials have revealed signatures of Majorana fermions which are the edge states of a bulk topological superconducting phase. We couple strong spin-orbit semiconductor InSb nanowires to conventional superconductors (NbTiN, Al) to obtain additional signatures of Majorana fermions and to explore the  topological phase transition. We have begun making hybrid superconductor-semiconductor quantum bit devices which will become building blocks of the planned braiding and topological quantum experiment.  We are also exploring how quantum dots can be chained together along the nanowire to realize the one-dimensional Kitaev model, a discrete way of generating Majorana modes.