Enhancement of Magnon Transport by Superconductor Meissner Screening

Abstract: Recent experiments observe the spin-wave-Meissner-current modes in ferromagnetic insulator-superconductor heterostructures, in which the coherently excited spin waves seemingly do not decay as usual beneath the superconductor strip [Borst et al., Science 382, 430 (2023)]. We interpret this phenomenon by demonstrating that the stray magnetic field emitted by the magnetization dynamics is reflected, focused, and enhanced inside the ferromagnet by the supercurrent induced in the superconductor, such that the group velocity of spin waves is strongly enhanced. Analytical and numerical calculations based on this model predict that the coherent transport of magnons is enhanced by close to 500% for yttrium iron garnet capped by superconducting NbN with a decay length exceeding millimeters. Our finding may augment the performance of magnons in quantum information and quantum transport processing.