Regensburg 2013 – scientific programme

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TUT: Tutorials

TUT 5: Tutorial: Topological Insulators and Majorana-Fermion Physics (TT)

TUT 5.3: Tutorial

Sunday, March 10, 2013, 17:40–18:25, H20

Majorana Fermions in Hybrid Nanosystems — •Michael Wimmer — Instituut-Lorentz, Universiteit Leiden, The Netherlands

Majorana fermions are particles that are their own anti-particle. To our current knowledge, they do not exist as elementary particles in nature. In the recent years it was however realized that quasi-particle excitations in solid state systems can mimic Majorana fermions. In particular, they appear in topological superconductors.

In the tutorial, I will show the basic properties of these ``solid state Majoranas'', and discuss how topological superconductors can be engineered in hybrid nanosystems consisting of ordinary superconductors and semiconductors. I will also briefly review the recent experiments that have found strong hints for the evidence of Majorana fermions in such hybrid systems. Finally, I will discuss some of the more exotic properties of Majorana fermions and how they are related to topological quantum computing.