Coherent Excited States in Superconductors due to a Microwave Field

We describe theoretically the depairing effect of a microwave field on diffusive s-wave superconductors. The ground state of the superconductor is altered qualitatively in analogy to the depairing due to a dc current. In contrast to dc depairing, the density of states acquires, for microwaves with frequency ω0, steps at multiples of the...