Andreev reflection at half-metal/superconductor interfaces with nonuniform magnetization

Joern N. Kupferschmidt; Piet W. Brouwer

doi:10.1103/PhysRevB.83.014512

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Andreev reflection at half-metal/superconductor interfaces with nonuniform magnetization

Joern N. Kupferschmidt, Piet W. Brouwer

DOI 10.1103/PhysRevB.83.014512 · Physical Review B

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Abstract

Andreev reflection at the interface between a half-metallic ferromagnet and a spin-singlet superconductor is possible only if it is accompanied by a spin flip. Here we calculate the Andreev reflection amplitudes for the case where the spin flip originates from a spatially nonuniform magnetization direction in the half-metal. We calculate both the microscopic Andreev reflection amplitude for a single reflection event and an effective Andreev reflection amplitude describing the effect of multiple Andreev reflections in a ballistic thin film geometry. It is shown that the angle and energy dependence of the Andreev reflection amplitude strongly depends on the orientation of the gradient of the magnetization with respect to the interface. We calculate the resulting effects on the subgap conductance as well as Josephson current for a few exemplary cases. Establishing a connection between the scattering approach employed here and earlier work that employs the quasiclassical formalism, we connect the symmetry properties of the Andreev reflection amplitudes to the symmetry properties of the anomalous Green function in the half-metal.