Keldysh field theory approach to direct electric and thermoelectric currents in quantum dots coupled to superconducting leads

Abstract

We study the transport properties of a quantum dot contacted to two superconducting reservoirs by means of the Keldysh field theory approach, showing how this technique allows us to straightforwardly recover previous results, resulting extremely effective in dealing with quantum transport problems. In particular, we determine the direct current occurring at equilibrium and the electric and thermoelectric currents triggered when the system is driven out of equilibrium by a voltage or a temperature bias, also for a normal-quantum dot-superconductor junction. The main result of the work is the derivation of the full expression for the thermoelectric current in a superconductor-quantum dot-superconductor junction for any values of the temperature difference between the superconducting leads. We show that in the linear response regime, in addition to the Josephson current, a weakly phase-dependent thermoelectric contribution occurs, provided that electron-hole symmetry is broken. Far from linearity, instead, other contributions arise which lead to thermoelectric effects, dominant at weak coupling, also in the presence of particle-hole symmetry.