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We report a systematic experimental study of mesoscopic conductance fluctuations in superconductor/normal/superconductor (SNS) devices Nb/InAs-nanowire/Nb. These fluctuations far exceed their value in the normal state and strongly depend on temperature even in the low-temperature regime. This dependence is attributed to high sensitivity of perfectly conducting channels to dephasing and the SNS fluctuations thus provide a sensitive probe of dephasing in a regime where normal transport fails to detect it. Further, the conductance fluctuations are strongly nonlinear in bias voltage and reveal subgap structure. The experimental findings are qualitatively explained in terms of multiple Andreev reflections in chaotic quantum dots with imperfect contacts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effect of Kondo correlations on the subgap structure of a quantum dot contacted by superconducting leads is investigated experimentally in indium-arsenide nanowires. When the zero-bias Kondo effect is suppressed by the superconducting pairing of the electrons a profound enhancement of the first-order Andreev reflection is observed. Devices with local gate control allow individual tuning of multiple quantum dots along the wire, a double dot with tunable interdot coupling is demonstrated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present the electric properties of p-InAs nanowire field-effect transistors showing ambipolar conduction. Be doped nanowires are grown by the vapor-solid-solid mechanism using molecular beam epitaxy with in situ deposited Au catalyst particles. P-type conduction in InAs nanowires is challenging because of the Fermi-level pinning above the conduction band edge at the nanowire surface that leads to creation of an electron inversion layer. We demonstrate that this task is possible without a modified surface and report a strong temperature dependence (10–105) of the on-off ratio caused by the surface inversion layer. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A key task in the emerging field of bioelectronics is the transduction between ionic/protonic and electronic signals at high fidelity. This is a considerable challenge since the two carrier types exhibit intrinsically different physics and are best supported by very different materials typeselectronic signals in inorganic semiconductors and ionic/protonic signals in organic or bio-organic polymers, gels, or electrolytes. Here we demonstrate a new class of organic-inorganic transducing interface featuring semiconducting nanowires electrostatically gated using a solid proton-transporting hygroscopic polymer. This model platform allows us to study the basic transducing mechanisms as well as deliver high fidelity signal conversion by tapping into and drawing together the best candidates from traditionally disparate realms of electronic materials research. By combining complementary n- and p-type transducers we demonstrate functional logic with significant potential for scaling toward high-density integrated bioelectronic circuitry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]