Engineering Superconducting Contacts Transparent to a Bipolar Graphene

Abstract

Graphene's exceptional electronic mobility, gate-tunability, and contact transparency with superconducting materials make it ideal for exploring the superconducting proximity effect. However, the work function difference between graphene and superconductors causes unavoidable doping of graphene near contacts, forming a p−n junction in the hole-doped regime and reducing the contact transparency. This challenges the device implementation that exploits graphene's bipolarity. To address this limitation, we developed a new fabrication scheme for two-dimensional superconducting contacts that allows independent control over charge concentration and polarity for both the graphene in contact with superconductors and the graphene channel. Contact transparency, conductance enhancement, and Josephson coupling were measured to confirm transparent contacts with both polarities of graphene. Moreover, we demonstrated the Andreev process in the quantum Hall edge state at a negative filling factor of ν = −2. This scheme will open up avenues for realizing various theoretical propositions using the bipolarity of graphene combined with superconductivity.