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Majorana

The Microsoft Research Santa Barbara (station Q) team pursued a different path, one that was as high-risk as it was high-reward: developing topologically protected qubits. And while we didn’t quite meet Michael’s original breakneck 10-year timeline, we are now well on our way to achieving it.

Summary of the key points from the scientific paper titled "Majorana quasiparticles in atomic spin chains on superconductors" by Stephan Rachel and Roland Wiesendanger:

Key Points: Majorana Quasiparticles: The paper discusses Majorana quasiparticles, which are particles that are their own antiparticles. These quasiparticles are of interest due to their potential applications in topological quantum computation1.

Atomic Spin Chains: The research focuses on atomic spin chains on superconductors, which are quasi-one-dimensional systems that can host Majorana quasiparticles.

Topological Superconductors: The study explores the emergence of Majorana states in topological superconductors, which are materials that exhibit special quantum properties.

Experimental Efforts: The paper highlights the experimental efforts to detect Majorana quasiparticles, including the challenges and improvements needed in materials science and atomic-scale characterization.

Potential Applications: Majorana quasiparticles have exciting potential applications in quantum computing due to their non-Abelian quantum exchange statistics, which could enable robust quantum information processing.

For the past decade, Majorana quasiparticles have become one of the hot topics in condensed matter research. Besides the fundamental interest in the realization of particles being their own antiparticles, going back to basic concepts of elementary particle physics, Majorana quasiparticles in condensed matter systems offer exciting potential applications in topological quantum computation due to their non-Abelian quantum exchange statistics. Motivated by theoretical predictions about possible realizations of Majorana quasiparticles as zero-energy modes at boundaries of topological superconductors, experimental efforts have focussed in particular on quasi-one-dimensional semiconductor-superconductor and magnet-superconductor hybrid systems. However, an unambiguous proof of the existence of Majorana quasiparticles is still challenging and requires considerable improvements in materials science, atomic-scale characterization and control of interface quality, as well as complementary approaches of detecting various facets of Majorana quasiparticles. Bottom-up atom-by-atom fabrication of disorder-free atomic spin chains on atomically clean superconducting substrates has recently allowed deep insight into the emergence of topological sub-gap Shiba bands and associated Majorana states from the level of individual atoms up to extended chains, thereby offering the possibility for critical tests of Majorana physics in disorder-free model-type 1D hybrid systems.