Effects of interband impurity scattering on superconducting density of states in a two-band superconductor

Abstract

We investigate interband impurity scattering effects on a double gap structure in the superconducting density of states (SDOS) in a two-band superconductor. Using the self-consistent t-matrix theory, we show how the double gap structure gradually disappears/revives when impurity concentration and the magnitude of impurity potential are varied. The increase of impurity concentration leads to an averaged single gap SDOS due to the mixing of two bands by interband scattering. However, this mixing effect is shown to disappear in the strong interband scattering limit. We also show that the intraband impurity scattering suppresses the interband scattering effect because it tends to exclude electrons away from impurity sites.