Artificial Kitaev chains in quantum dots coupled through superconductors

Add to your list(s) Download to your calendar using vCal

• Prof. Greg Mazur
• Thursday 02 October 2025, 14:00-15:30
• Seminar Room 3, RDC.

If you have a question about this talk, please contact Bo Peng.

Majorana zero modes (MZMs)—spinless, charge-neutral, zero-energy excitations—arise at the boundaries of one-dimensional p-wave superconductors and are promising building blocks for fault-tolerant quantum computing. Candidate platforms include topological insulators, spin–orbit-coupled semiconducting nanowires, iron-based superconductors, and fractional quantum Hall systems. Here we pursue a bottom-up route: semiconductor quantum dots with strong spin–orbit coupling, coupled via superconductors to realize the unit cell of the Kitaev chain [1,2]. Using InSb nanowires clad with epitaxial aluminum half-shells, we engineer fine-tuned paired MZMs within minimal chains, enabling controlled studies of their hybridization, fermion parity, and robustness to disorder and gating [3]. I will present an experimental framework for assembling and characterizing basic Kitaev-chain components in this hybrid platform, followed by systematic “chain-scaling” results that track the evolution from a single unit cell to extended chains [4]. I will conclude with outlook protocols for reading out quantum information in this architecture.

[1] Wang, G., Dvir, T., Mazur, G. P., Liu, C. X., van Loo, N., Ten Haaf, S. L., ... & Kouwenhoven, L. P. (2022). Singlet and triplet Cooper pair splitting in hybrid superconducting nanowires. Nature, 612(7940), 448-453. [2] Dvir, T., Wang, G., van Loo, N., Liu, C. X., Mazur, G. P., Bordin, A., ... & Kouwenhoven, L. P. (2023). Realization of a minimal Kitaev chain in coupled quantum dots. Nature, 614(7948), 445-450. [3] Leijnse, M. and Flensberg, K., 2012. Parity qubits and poor man’s Majorana bound states in double quantum dots. PRB , 86(13), p.134528. [4] Bordin, A., Liu, C. X., Dvir, T., Zatelli, F., Ten Haaf, S. L., van Driel, D., ... & Mazur, G. P. (2025). Enhanced Majorana stability in a three-site Kitaev chain. Nature Nanotechnology, 1-6.

This talk is part of the Theory of Condensed Matter series.

This talk is included in these lists:

• All Cavendish Laboratory Seminars
• All Talks (aka the CURE list)
• Centre for Health Leadership and Enterprise
• Combined TCM Seminars and TCM blackboard seminar listing
• Featured lists
• Lennard-Jones Centre external
• ME Seminar
• Neurons, Fake News, DNA and your iPhone: The Mathematics of Information
• PMRFPS's
• School of Physical Sciences
• Seminar Room 3, RDC
• Theory of Condensed Matter
• Thin Film Magnetic Talks
• few29

Note that ex-directory lists are not shown.