Speaker
Description
Majorana zero modes are fermion-like excitations that were originally proposed in particle physics by Ettore Majorana and are characterized as being their own anti-particle. In condensed matter systems Majorana zero modes occur as fractionalized excitations with topologically protected degeneracy associated with such excitations. For over a decade the only candidate systems for observing Majorana zero modes were the non-Abelian fractional quantum Hall state and chiral p-wave superconductors. In this colloquium, I will start by explaining the basic ideas of topological quantum computation using Majorana zero modes and the potential advantages over existing systems. I will then discuss the current experimental progress, challenges in the field and our theoretical analysis of current devices. I will then provide a more detailed explanation of braiding, Majorana operators and the associated topological degeneracy.
