Differential conductance of normal metal-insulator-d-wave superconductor junctions with interface roughness

Abstract

Within the framework of Blonder-Tinkham-Klapwijk (BTK) model and taking into account the interface roughness, we calculate the differential conductance of normal metal-insulator-d-wave superconductor junctions. We find that the tunneling spectrum depends strongly on both the incident angle of electrons and the crystalline axis orientation of the superconductor, and exhibits the zero-bias anomaly under suitable arrangements. Interestingly, even in the absence of the insulating layer, the tunneling spectrum of normal metal-d-wave superconductor junctions differs significantly from that for normal metal-s-wave superconductor due to the interface roughness. Moreover, both the tunnel conductance peak at the energy gap and the zero-bias conductance peak are suppressed by the interface roughness. Our results can explain many experimental measurements on the tunneling spectra of high-T c superconductors.