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IOP Publishing, New Journal of Physics, 3(14), p. 035019, 2012

DOI: 10.1088/1367-2630/14/3/035019

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Coulomb-assisted braiding of Majorana fermions in a Josephson junction array

Journal article published in 2011 by B. van Heck ORCID, A. R. Akhmerov, F. Hassler, M. Burrello, C. W. J. Beenakker ORCID
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.
This paper is made freely available by the publisher.

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Abstract

We show how to exchange (braid) Majorana fermions in a network of superconducting nanowires by control over Coulomb interactions rather than tunneling. Even though Majorana fermions are charge-neutral quasiparticles (equal to their own antiparticle), they have an effective long-range interaction through the even-odd electron number dependence of the superconducting ground state. The flux through a split Josephson junction controls this interaction via the ratio of Josephson and charging energies, with exponential sensitivity. By switching the interaction on and off in neighboring segments of a Josephson junction array, the non-Abelian braiding statistics can be realized without the need to control tunnel couplings by gate electrodes. This is a solution to the problem how to operate on topological qubits when gate voltages are screened by the superconductor.