Dr. Kathryn Moler is the Marvin Chodorow Professor and Professor of Applied Physics, of Physics and of Energy Science Engineering at Stanford University. Her Moler Group research team focuses on magnetic imaging of mesoscopic systems and quantum materials.
Title: Seeing Phase Coherence in Superconductors
Abstract: Superconductors are so quantum that John Bardeen is said to have described them as being “coherent over miles of dirty lead wire.” I will show images to help you visualize how signatures of the phase coherence help us to understand the superconducting state. In three- and two-dimensional materials, images of vortices in various unconventional superconducting crystals and heterostructures test theories of the underlying materials. In one- and zero-dimensional devices, current-phase relations characterize superconducting quantum devices. By imaging the magnetic susceptibility of nanopatterned two-dimensional superconductor-semiconductor heterostructures, we can visualize the breakdown of phase coherence that drives the superconductor-insulator quantum phase transition. From bulk crystals to single junctions to the edge of the quantum phase transition, imaging lets us study superconductivity from where it is robust to where it breaks down.
