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1. Tuning metal/superconductor to insulator/superconductor coupling via control of proximity enhancement between NbSe 2 monolayers

   https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-648X/acbf92  

   Chiatti, Olivio ; Mihov, Klara ; Griffin, Theodor U. ; Grosse, Corinna ; Alemayehu, Matti B. ; Hite, Kyle ; Hamann, Danielle ; Mogilatenko, Anna ; Johnson, David C. ; Fischer, Saskia F. ( March 2023 , Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter)

   The interplay between charge transfer and electronic disorder in transition-metal dichalcogenide multilayers gives rise to superconductive coupling driven by proximity enhancement, tunneling and superconducting fluctuations, of a yet unwieldy variety. Artificial spacer layers introduced with atomic precision change the density of states by charge transfer. Here, we tune the superconductive coupling between$\text{NbS}{\text{e}}_{\text{2}}$monolayers from proximity-enhanced to tunneling-dominated. We correlate normal and superconducting properties in${\left[{\left(\text{SnSe}\right)}_{1+\delta }\right]}_m{\left[\text{NbS}{\text{e}}_{\text{2}}\right]}_1$tailored multilayers with varying SnSe layer thickness ($m=1-15$). From high-field magnetotransport the critical fields yield Ginzburg–Landau coherence lengths with an increase of$140\mathrm{\%}$cross-plane ($m=1-9$), trending towards two-dimensional superconductivity for$m>9$. We show cross-overs between three regimes: metallic with proximity-enhanced coupling ($m=1-4$), disordered-metallic with intermediate coupling ($m=5-9$) and insulating with Josephson tunneling ($m>9$). Our results demonstrate that stacking metal mono- and dichalcogenides allows to convert a metal/superconductor into an insulator/superconductor system, prospecting the control of two-dimensional superconductivity in embedded layers.

    

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2. The FRB 20190520B Sight Line Intersects Foreground Galaxy Clusters

   https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/acefb5  

   Lee, Khee-Gan ; Khrykin, Ilya S. ; Simha, Sunil ; Ata, Metin ; Huang, Yuxin ; Prochaska, J. Xavier ; Tejos, Nicolas ; Cooke, Jeff ; Nagamine, Kentaro ; Zhang, Jielai ( August 2023 , The Astrophysical Journal Letters)

   The repeating fast radio burst FRB 20190520B is an anomaly of the FRB population thanks to its high dispersion measure (DM = 1205 pc cm⁻³) despite its low redshift ofz_frb= 0.241. This excess has been attributed to a large host contribution of DM_host≈ 900 pc cm⁻³, far larger than any other known FRB. In this paper, we describe spectroscopic observations of the FRB 20190520B field obtained as part of the FLIMFLAM survey, which yielded 701 galaxy redshifts in the field. We find multiple foreground galaxy groups and clusters, for which we then estimated halo masses by comparing their richness with numerical simulations. We discover two separateM_halo> 10¹⁴M_⊙galaxy clusters atz= 0.1867 and 0.2170 that are directly intersected by the FRB sight line within their characteristic halo radiusr₂₀₀. Subtracting off their estimated DM contributions, as well that of the diffuse intergalactic medium, we estimate a host contribution of${\mathrm{D}\mathrm{M}}_{\mathrm{h}\mathrm{o}\mathrm{s}\mathrm{t}}={430}_{-220}^{+140}$or${280}_{-170}^{+140}\mathrm{p}\mathrm{c}{\mathrm{c}\mathrm{m}}^{-3}$(observed frame), depending on whether we assume that the halo gas extends tor₂₀₀or 2 ×r₂₀₀. This significantly smaller DM_host—no longer the largest known value—is now consistent with Hαemission measures of the host galaxy without invoking unusually high gas temperatures. Combined with the observed FRB scattering timescale, we estimate the turbulent fluctuation and geometric amplification factor of the scattering layer to be$\tilde{F}G\approx 4.5–11{({\mathrm{pc}}^2\mathrm{km})}^{-1/3}$, suggesting that most of the gas is close to the FRB host. This result illustrates the importance of incorporating foreground data for FRB analyses both for understanding the nature of FRBs and to realize their potential as a cosmological probe.

    

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3. The Stellar Mass–Black Hole Mass Relation at z ∼ 2 down to BH∼107M⊙ Determined by HETDEX

   https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/acc2c2  

   Zhang, Yechi ; Ouchi, Masami ; Gebhardt, Karl ; Liu, Chenxu ; Harikane, Yuichi ; Cooper, Erin Mentuch ; Davis, Dustin ; Farrow, Daniel J. ; Gawiser, Eric ; Hill, Gary J. ; et al ( May 2023 , The Astrophysical Journal)

   We investigate the stellar mass–black hole mass (${\mathit{}}_{*}–{\mathit{}}_{\mathrm{BH}}$) relation with type 1 active galactic nuclei (AGNs) down to${\mathit{}}_{\mathrm{BH}}={10}^7{M}_{\odot }$, corresponding to a ≃ −21 absolute magnitude in rest-frame ultraviolet, atz= 2–2.5. Exploiting the deep and large-area spectroscopic survey of the Hobby–Eberly Telescope Dark Energy Experiment (HETDEX), we identify 66 type 1 AGNs with${\mathit{}}_{\mathrm{BH}}$ranging from 10⁷–10¹⁰M_⊙that are measured with single-epoch virial method using Civemission lines detected in the HETDEX spectra.${\mathit{}}_{*}$of the host galaxies are estimated from optical to near-infrared photometric data taken with Spitzer, the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, and ground-based 4–8 m class telescopes byCIGALEspectral energy distribution (SED) fitting. We further assess the validity of SED fitting in two cases by host-nuclear decomposition performed through surface brightness profile fitting on spatially resolved host galaxies with the James Webb Space Telescope/NIRCam CEERS data. We obtain the${\mathit{}}_{*}–{\mathit{}}_{\mathrm{BH}}$relation covering the unexplored low-mass ranges of${\mathit{}}_{\mathrm{BH}}\sim {10}^7–{10}^8{M}_{\odot }$, and conduct forward modeling to fully account for the selection biases and observational uncertainties. The intrinsic${\mathit{}}_{*}–{\mathit{}}_{\mathrm{BH}}$relation atz∼ 2 has a moderate positive offset of 0.52 ± 0.14 dex from the local relation, suggestive of more efficient black hole growth at higher redshift even in the low-mass regime of${\mathit{}}_{\mathrm{BH}}\sim {10}^7–{10}^8{M}_{\odot }$. Our${\mathit{}}_{*}–{\mathit{}}_{\mathrm{BH}}$relation is inconsistent with the${\mathit{}}_{\mathrm{BH}}$suppression at the low-${\mathit{}}_{*}$regime predicted by recent hydrodynamic simulations at a 98% confidence level, suggesting that feedback in the low-mass systems may be weaker than those produced in hydrodynamic simulations.

    

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4. Chiral and counter-propagating Majorana fermions in a p-wave superconductor

   https://doi.org/10.1088/1367-2630/ab5cad  

   Hu, Haiping ; Satija, Indubala I. ; Zhao, Erhai ( December 2019 , New Journal of Physics)

   Chiral and helical Majorana fermions are two archetypal edge excitations in two-dimensional topological superconductors. They emerge from systems of different Altland–Zirnbauer symmetries and characterized by$\mathbb{Z}$and${\mathbb{Z}}_2$topological invariants respectively. It seems improbable to tune a pair of co-propagating chiral edge modes to counter-propagate in a single system without symmetry breaking. Here, we explore the peculiar behaviors of Majorana edge modes in topological superconductors with an additional ‘mirror’ symmetry which changes the bulk topological invariant to$\mathbb{Z}\oplus \mathbb{Z}$type. A theoretical toy model describing the proximity structure of a Chern insulator and ap_x-wave superconductor is proposed and solved analytically to illustrate a direct transition between two topologically nontrivial phases. The weak pairing phase has two chiral Majorana edge modes, while the strong pairing phase is characterized by mirror-graded Chern number and hosts a pair of counter-propagating Majorana fermions protected by the mirror symmetry. The edge theory is worked out in detail, and implications to braiding of Majorana fermions are discussed.

    

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5. Comparison of Lithium Diffusion Coefficient Measurements in Tellurium Electrodes via Different Electrochemical Techniques

   https://doi.org/10.1149/1945-7111/acd43e  

   Wang, Jing ; Koenig, Jr, Gary M. ( May 2023 , Journal of The Electrochemical Society)

   Both thin (55μm) composite and thick (350μm) all active material battery porous electrodes were prepared for estimating the diffusion coefficient of Li⁺($D_{{\mathit{Li}}^{+}})$in tellurium (Te) during electrochemical lithiation. Galvanostatic intermittent titration technique (GITT), cyclic voltammetry (CV), and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) were applied to quantify the chemical lithium solid-state diffusion coefficient within the Te active material in the electrodes. Multiple methods of GITT and EIS were assessed. For the composite Te electrodes, the$D_{{\mathit{Li}}^{+}}$was on the order of 10⁻¹¹cm²s⁻¹from both CV and GITT methods, but 10⁻⁹cm²s⁻¹from EIS. For the thick tellurium electrodes, both GITT and EIS resulted in lithium diffusion coefficient estimates in the range of 10⁻¹¹–10⁻¹²cm²s⁻¹. The general trend across all methods that quantified the diffusion coefficient as a function of lithiation of tellurium was that the$D_{{\mathit{Li}}^{+}}$decreased rapidly when the Te material was initially lithiated. The$D_{{\mathit{Li}}^{+}}$at the phase transition voltage plateau (∼1.7 V, vs Li/Li⁺, where both Te and Li₂Te were expected) had the lowest$D_{{\mathit{Li}}^{+}},$while the$D_{{\mathit{Li}}^{+}}$both before and after the plateau was generally higher. Among all the electrochemical measurements of$D_{{\mathit{Li}}^{+}},$the modified GITT method with modelling the relaxation region resulted in relatively low scatter in the data, provided values as a function of lithiation, and was well suited to thick electrodes with a flat discharge plateau as was the case herein.

    

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