96 research outputs found
Tunneling Spectroscopy and Vortex Imaging in Boron-Doped Diamond
We present the first scanning tunneling spectroscopy study of
single-crystalline boron doped diamond. The measurements were performed below
100 mK with a low temperature scanning tunneling microscope. The tunneling
density of states displays a clear superconducting gap. The temperature
evolution of the order parameter follows the weak coupling BCS law with
. Vortex imaging at low magnetic field also
reveals localized states inside the vortex core that are unexpected for such a
dirty superconductor.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, replaced with revised versio
Ballistic effects in a proximity induced superconducting diffusive metal
Using a Scanning Tunneling Microscope (STM), we investigate the Local Density
of States (LDOS) of artificially fabricated normal metal nano-structures in
contact with a superconductor. Very low temperature local spectroscopic
measurements (100 mK) reveal the presence of well defined subgap peaks at
energy |E|<Delta in the LDOS at various positions of the STM tip. Although no
clear correlations between the LDOS and the shape of the samples have emerged,
some of the peak features suggest they originate from quasi-particle bound
states within the normal metal structures (De Gennes St James states).
Refocusing of electronic trajectories induced by the granular srtucture of the
samples can explain the observation of spatially uncorrelated interference
effects in a non-ballistic medium.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Superconducting properties of very high quality NbN thin films grown by high temperature chemical vapor deposition
Niobium nitride (NbN) is widely used in high-frequency superconducting
electronics circuits because it has one of the highest superconducting
transition temperatures ( 16.5 K) and largest gap among
conventional superconductors. In its thin-film form, the of NbN is very
sensitive to growth conditions and it still remains a challenge to grow NbN
thin film (below 50 nm) with high . Here, we report on the superconducting
properties of NbN thin films grown by high-temperature chemical vapor
deposition (HTCVD). Transport measurements reveal significantly lower disorder
than previously reported, characterized by a Ioffe-Regel ()
parameter of 14. Accordingly we observe 17.06 K (point of
50% of normal state resistance), the highest value reported so far for films of
thickness below 50 nm, indicating that HTCVD could be particularly useful for
growing high quality NbN thin films
Superconducting group-IV semiconductors
International audienceWe present recent achievements and predictions in the field of doping-induced superconductivity in column IV-based covalent semiconductors, with a focus on Bdoped diamond and silicon. Despite the amount of experimental and theoretical work produced over the last four years, many open questions and puzzling results remain to be clarified. The nature of the coupling (electronic correlation and/or phonon-mediated), the relationship between the doping concentration and the critical temperature (TC), which determines the prospects for higher transition temperatures, as well as the influence of disorder and dopant homogeneity, are debated issues that will determine the future of the field. We suggest that innovative superconducting devices, combining specific properties of diamond or silicon, and the maturity of semiconductor-based technologies, will soon be developed
Metal-to-insulator transition and superconductivity in boron-doped diamond
International audienceThe experimental discovery of superconductivity in boron-doped diamond came as a major surprise to both the diamond and the superconducting materials communities. The main experimental results obtained since then on single-crystal diamond epilayers are reviewed and applied to calculations, and some open questions are identified. The critical doping of the metal-to-insulator transition (MIT) was found to coincide with that necessary for superconductivity to occur. Some of the critical exponents of the MIT were determined and superconducting diamond was found to follow a conventional type II behaviour in the dirty limit, with relatively high critical temperature values quite close to the doping-induced insulator-to-metal transition. This could indicate that on the metallic side both the electron-phonon coupling and the screening parameter depend on the boron concentration. In our view, doped diamond is a potential model system for the study of electronic phase transitions and a stimulating example for other semiconductors such as germanium and silicon
Probing thermalization and dynamics of high-energy quasiparticles in a superconducting nanowire by scanning critical current microscopy
Besides its fundamental interest, understanding the dynamics of pair breaking
in superconducting nanostructures is a central issue to optimize the
performances of superconducting devices such as qubits or photon detectors.
However, despite substantial research efforts, these dynamics are still not
well understood as this requires experiments in which quasiparticles are
injected in a controlled fashion. Until now, such experiments have employed
solid-state tunnel junctions with a fixed tunnel barrier. Here we use instead a
cryogenic scanning tunnelling microscope to tune independently the energy and
the rate of quasiparticle injection through, respectively, the bias voltage and
the tunnelling current. For high energy quasiparticles, we observe the
reduction of the critical current of a nanowire and show it is mainly
controlled by the injected power and, marginally, by the injection rate. Our
results prove a thermal mechanism for the reduction of the critical current and
unveil the rapid dynamics of the generated hot spot.Comment: 25 pages, 14 figure
Low-temperature transport in highly boron-doped nanocrystalline diamond
International audienceWe studied the transport properties of highly boron-doped nanocrystalline diamond thin films at temperatures down to 50 mK. The system undergoes a doping-induced metal-insulator transition with an interplay between intergranular conductance g and intragranular conductance g0, as expected for a granular system. The conduction mechanism in the case of the low-conductivity films close to the metal-insulator transition has a temperature dependence similar to Efros-Shklovskii type of hopping. On the metallic side of the transition, in the normal state, a logarithmic temperature dependence of the conductivity is observed, as expected for a metallic granular system. Metallic samples far away from the transition show similarities to heavily borondoped single-crystal diamond. Close to the transition, the behavior is richer. Global phase coherence leads in both cases to superconductivity also checked by ac susceptibility , but a peak in the low-temperature magnetoresistance measurements occurs for samples close to the transition. Corrections to the conductance according to superconducting fluctuations account for this negative magnetoresistance
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