Superconductivity in charge Kondo systems

Reentrant behavior is known to exist and magnetic-field-induced superconductivity has been predicted in superconductors with Kondo impurities. We present a simple framework for understanding these phenomena and generalize it to explain the long-standing puzzle of paramagnetic reentrance in thick proximity systems as due to small amounts of Kondo impurities.

The Kondo effect and superconductivity are both prime examples of many-body phenomena. Here we report transport measurements on a carbon nanotube quantum dot coupled to superconducting leads that show a delicate interplay between both effects. We demonstrate that the superconductivity of the leads does not destroy the Kondo correlations on the quantum dot when the Kondo temperature, which varies for different single-electron states, exceeds the superconducting gap energy.

The remarkable robustness of high-temperature superconductors against disorder remains a controversial obstacle towards the elucidation of their pairing state. Indeed, experiments report a weak suppression rate of the transition temperature $T_{c}$ with disorder, significantly smaller than the universal value predicted by extensions of the conventional theory of dirty superconductors. However, in many high-$T_{c}$ compounds, superconductivity appears near a putative magnetic ...

Understanding the emergence and subsequent behavior of heavy electrons in Kondo lattice materials is one of the grand challenges in condensed matter physics. In this perspective we review the progress that has been made during the past decade and suggest some directions for future research. Our focus will be on developing a new microscopic framework that incorporates the basic concepts that emerge from a phenomenological description of the key experimental findings.

This article summarizes our understanding of the Kondo effect in graphene, primarily from a theoretical perspective. We shall describe different ways to create magnetic moments in graphene, either by adatom deposition or via defects. For dilute moments, the theoretical description is in terms of effective Anderson or Kondo impurity models coupled to graphene's Dirac electrons. We shall discuss in detail the physics of these models, including their quantum phase transitions an...

We study the Falikov-Kimball model with the pair hopping between the conduction and localized bands to discuss how the charge Kondo effect is realized. By combining dynamical mean-field theory with the continuous time quantum Monte Carlo method, we clarify that the charge Kondo state survives even at zero temperature and this competes with the charge ordered and s-wave superconducting states. The role of the interorbital repulsion for the superconducting state is also address...

When the electron-phonon coupling is quadratic in the phonon coordinates, electrons can pair to form bipolarons due to phonon zero-point fluctuations, a purely quantum effect. We study superconductivity originating from this pairing mechanism in a minimal model and reveal that, in the strong coupling regime, the critical temperature ($T_c$) is only mildly suppressed by the coupling strength, in stark contrast to the exponential suppression in linearly coupled systems, thus im...

We present a self-consistent theory of superconductors in the presence of Kondo impurities, using large-$N$ slave-boson methods to treat the impurity dynamics. The technique is tested on the s-wave case and shown to give good results compared to other methods for $T_K > T_c$. We calculate low temperature thermodynamic and transport properties for various superconducting states, including isotropic s-wave and representative anisotropic model states with line and point nodes on...

Magnetic molecules adsorbed on a superconductor give rise to a local competition of Cooper pair and Kondo singlet formation inducing subgap bound states. For Manganese-phthalocyanine molecules on a Pb(111) substrate, scanning tunneling spectroscopy resolves pairs of subgap bound states and two Kondo screening channels. We show in a combined approach of scaling and numerical renormalization group calculations that the intriguing relation between Kondo screening and superconduc...

Observing that several U and Ce based candidate triplet superconductors share a common structural motif, with pairs of magnetic atoms separated by an inversion center, we hypothesize a triplet pairing mechanism based on an interplay of Hund's and Kondo interactions that is unique to this structure. In the presence of Hund's interactions, valence fluctuations generate a triplet superexchange between electrons and local moments. The offset from the center of symmetry allows spi...