Interactions: Manisha Thakurathi

Manisha won a Nature Reviews Physics poster prize at the Quantum Designer Physics conference in San Sebastian last June.

Can you briefly explain the results for which you got the award? 

The award was based on a study of double Rashba nanowires coupled to an s-wave superconductor, which has been recently proposed as a versatile platform to generate Kramers pairs of Majorana bound states in the absence of magnetic field. We analyze the effects of electron-electron interactions and disorder on the system and find that the interactions drive the system into the topological phase. We further consider an external magnetic field along the nanowires and demonstrate that the setup exhibits a new previously overlooked Majorana phase that emerges at low magnetic field.

What do you hope will be the impact of your research?

The field of topological quantum computation with Majorana bound states (MBSs) has grown immensely in the past decade. We propose a new setup for the appearance of MBSs, where MBSs exhibit sufficiently short localization lengths, which makes them ideal candidates for future braiding experiments.

What made you want to be a physicist in the first place?

Ever since my school and college days, I enjoyed studying and understanding the universal laws of nature that govern things around us. Also I had an incredible physics teacher during my high school who inspired me towards the amazing science which happen to be Physics !!

If you weren’t a physicist, what would you like to be (and why)?

I also had interest in medicine, perhaps I would have been a medical professional (A REAL DOCTOR).

Which is the development that you would really like to see in the next 10 years?

A topological quantum computer or a room-temperature superconductor .

What’s your favourite (quasi-)particle?

Based on my area of research interest , two are my favourites: Bogoliubov quasiparticles and composite fermions.