The Superconductor-Insulator Transition in Twisted Bilayer Graphene

Application 2018024: The Superconductor-Insulator Transition in Twisted Bilayer Graphene 1 2 C. R. Dean and D. Shahar Department of Physics, Columbia University, New York, New York 10027, USA.

Department of Condensed Matter Physics, The Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 76100, Israel.

In 2004 a revolution engulfed the world of quantum physics. For the first time an ideal single atomic-layer was realized in a laboratory. Researcher were able to isolate a single layer of carbon atoms from graphite, creating a material called graphene.

Graphene is poised to play a major role in the future of technology due to its elec- tronic and mechanical properties. Following the isolation of mono-layer graphene scientists began to build more sophisticated structures. The first major advancement was the bilayer system stacking two graphene layer on top of each other. Material ’sandwiches’ existed before in other semiconducting materials but the exciting as- pect with graphene was that it was possible to add a small twist to the structure and rotate the layers with respect teach other. This was successfully done in early 2018 and resulted in the first discovery of superconductivity in a graphene system. In this project we intend to study this novel superconducting state and other quantum phases that appear in conjunction with it.