Derek Meyers
Oklahoma State University, OK·Physics·Early-career
Certain materials conduct electricity in ways that depend not on their chemistry alone but on the global shape, or topology, of their electron states. Those topological phases are robust against small disturbances, which is why they are attractive as building blocks for quantum computers and other quantum information technologies.
- Fields
Physics
Materials Science
- Topics
topological phases
topological materials
complex oxides
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Jun 2029
What they work on
- Synthesize ruthenate heterostructures confined along atypical crystallographic orientations by pulsed laser deposition, adapting growth to stabilize the films despite polarity mismatch between stacked oxide layers.
- Map the electronic band structure of these engineered ruthenate films with angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy to test theoretical predictions of topological phases in confined geometries.
- Probe the heterostructures edge-on with cross-sectional scanning tunneling microscopy, combined with surface preservation and cleaning procedures, to connect interface structure to electronic behavior.
- Investigate the unconventional superconductivity and ferromagnetic instability of strontium ruthenate in geometrically engineered form, assessing its relevance to Majorana fermions and quantum information applications.
More about the research
Complex oxides, compounds built from metals and oxygen, are predicted to host such phases, in some cases at temperatures high enough for practical use. The obstacle has been synthesis and measurement: getting these materials into the needed form and then reading out their electronic structure is genuinely hard.
Why it matters
Topological electronic phases are prized for quantum information hardware because their properties resist disorder, but few materials host them at usable temperatures. Demonstrating such phases in engineered ruthenate oxide films would establish a new class of candidate materials and clarify whether they can serve in quantum devices, while the orientation-control growth methods could aid oxide electronics more generally.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Heike Pfau
Pennsylvania State University, PA·Physics·Early-career
Use uniaxial pressure cells to strain unconventional superconductors and measure their changing electronic structure with angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy (ARPES), to uncover the interactions that cause electrons to pair.
Jifa Tian
University of Wyoming, WY·Physics
Determine the roles and behavior of unconventional magnetic domains, regions where atomic magnetic moments align, in few-layer two-dimensional van der Waals magnets using magnetotransport and low-temperature magnetic force microscopy.
Jeremy Levy
University of Pittsburgh, PA·Physics
Create twisted heterostructures from free-standing complex oxide membranes and use moiré periodicity and atomic alignment as design parameters for new electronic, magnetic and structural phases.
The school
Oklahoma State University: 15 labs on PI Pages, $254M a year on research, 238 research doctorates a year.
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