In-gap bound states induced by interstitial Fe impurities in iron-based superconductors

•We provide an explanation for the interesting STM observation of the robust zero energy bound state on the interstitial Fe impurities in iron-based superconductors.

Based on a two-orbit four-band tight binding model, we investigate the low-lying electronic states around the interstitial excess Fe ions in the iron-based superconductors by using T-matrix approach. It is shown that the local density of states at the interstitial Fe impurity (IFI) possesses a strong resonance inside the gap, which seems to be insensitive to the doping and the pairing symmetry in the Fe–Fe plane, while a single or two resonances appear at the nearest neighboring (NN) Fe sites. The location and height of the resonance peaks only depend on the hopping t and the pairing parameter ΔI between the IFI and the NN Fe sites. These in-gap resonances are originated in the Andreev’s bound states due to the quasiparticle tunneling through the IFI, leading to the change of the magnitude of the superconducting order parameter. When both t and ΔI are small, this robust zero-energy bound state near the IFI is consistent with recent scanning tunneling microscopy observations.