Manipulating Majorana fermions in one-dimensional spin-orbit-coupled atomic Fermi gases

Abstract

Majorana fermions are promising candidates for storing and processing information in topological quantum computation. The ability to control such individual information carriers in trapped ultracold atomic Fermi gases is a novel theme in quantum information science. However, fermionic atoms are neutral and thus are difficult to manipulate. Here, we theoretically investigate the control of emergent Majorana fermions in one-dimensional spin-orbit-coupled atomic Fermi gases. We discuss (i) how to move Majorana fermions by increasing or decreasing an effective Zeeman field, which acts like a solid-state control voltage gate, and (ii) how to create a pair of Majorana fermions by adding a magnetic impurity potential. We discuss the experimental realization of our control scheme in an ultracold Fermi gas of ${}^{40}$K atoms.