Superconducting topological surface states in the noncentrosymmetric bulk superconductor PbTaSe ₂

Abstract

The search for topological superconductors (TSCs) is one of the most urgent contemporary problems in condensed matter systems. TSCs are characterized by a full superconducting gap in the bulk and topologically protected gapless surface (or edge) states. Within each vortex core of TSCs, there exists the zero-energy Majorana bound states, which are predicted to exhibit non-Abelian statistics and to form the basis of the fault-tolerant quantum computation. To date, no stoichiometric bulk material exhibits the required topological surface states (TSSs) at the Fermi level (<i>E</i>_F) combined with fully gapped bulk superconductivity. We report atomic-scale visualization of the TSSs of the noncentrosymmetric fully gapped superconductor PbTaSe₂. Using quasi-particle scattering interference imaging, we find two TSSs with a Dirac point at <i>E</i> ≅ 1.0 eV, of which the inner TSS and the partial outer TSS cross <i>E</i>_F, on the Pb-terminated surface of this fully gapped superconductor. This discovery reveals PbTaSe₂ as a promising candidate for TSC.