211 research outputs found
Antiferromagnetic Domain Wall Engineering in Chromium Films
We have engineered an antiferromagnetic domain wall by utilizing a magnetic
frustration effect of a thin iron cap layer deposited on a chromium film.
Through lithography and wet etching we selectively remove areas of the Fe cap
layer to form a patterned ferromagnetic mask over the Cr film. Removing the Fe
locally removes magnetic frustration in user-defined regions of the Cr film. We
present x-ray microdiffraction microscopy results confirming the formation of a
90{\deg} spin-density wave propagation domain wall in Cr. This domain wall
nucleates at the boundary defined by our Fe mask.Comment: submitted to AP
Evidence of Strong-Coupled Superconductivity in CaC6 from Tunneling Spectroscopy
Point-contact tunneling on CaC crystals reproducibly reveals
superconducting gaps, , of 2.30.2 meV which are ~40% larger
than earlier reports. That puts CaC into the class of very strong-coupled
superconductors since 2/kT~4.6. Thus soft Ca phonons will be
primarily involved in the superconductivity, a conclusion that explains the
large Ca isotope effect found recently for CaC. Consistency among
superconductor-insulator-normal metal (SIN), SIS and Andreev reflection (SN)
junctions reinforces the intrinsic nature of this result.Comment: 2nd version, 4 pages, 4 figures, re-submitted to Physical Review
Letter
Metal-assisted etching of silicon molds for electroforming
Ordered arrays of high-aspect-ratio micro/nanostructures in semiconductors stirred a huge scientific interest due to their unique one-dimensional physical morphology and the associated electrical, mechanical, chemical, optoelectronic, and thermal properties. Metal-assisted chemical etching enables fabrication of such high aspect ratio Si nanostructures with controlled diameter, shape, length, and packing density, but suffers from structure deformation and shape inconsistency due to uncontrolled migration of noble metal structures during etching. Hereby the authors prove that a Ti adhesion layer helps in stabilizing gold structures, preventing their migration on the wafer surface while not impeding the etching. Based on this finding, the authors demonstrate that the method can be used to fabricate linear Fresnel zone plates
On the correct formula for the lifetime broadened superconducting density of states
We argue that the well known Dynes formula [Dynes R C {\it et al.} 1978 {\it
Phys. Rev. Lett.} {\bf 41} 1509] for the superconducting quasiparticle density
of states, which tries to incorporate the lifetime broadening in an approximate
way, cannot be justified microscopically for conventional superconductors.
Instead, we propose a new simple formula in which the energy gap has a finite
imaginary part and the quasiparticle energy is real. We prove that
in the quasiparticle approximation 2 gives the quasiparticle decay
rate at the gap edge for conventional superconductors. This conclusion does not
depend on the nature of interactions that cause the quasiparticle decay. The
new formula is tested on the case of a strong coupling superconductor
PbBi and an excellent agreement with theoretical predictions is
obtained. While both the Dynes formula and the one proposed in this work give
good fits and fit parameters for PbBi, only the latter formula
can be justified microscopically.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figure
STM studies of CoxNbSe2 and MnxNbSe2
Cobalt and Manganese intercalated NbSe(2) single crystals have been synthesized and characterized by DC magnetization and scanning tunnelling microscopy (STM) at low temperatures. We observed a pronounced peak effect in magnetization for both Co and Mn intercalated samples that we further investigated by low temperature STM. A structural phase transition of the vortex lattice (VL) has been observed for applied magnetic fields corresponding to the peak in magnetization
Effect of magnetic impurities on the vortex lattice properties in NbSe2 single crystals
We report a pronounced peak effect in the magnetization of CoxNbSe2 single crystals with critical temperatures T-c ranging between 7.1 and 5.0 K, and MnxNbSe2 single crystals with critical temperatures down to 3.4 K. We correlate the peak effect in magnetization with the structure of the vortex lattice across the peak-effect region using scanning-tunneling microscopy. Magnetization measurements show that the amplitude of the peak effect in the case of CoxNbSe2 exhibits a nonmonotonic behavior as a function of the Co content, reaching a maximum for concentration of Co of about 0.4 at. % (corresponding to a T-c of 5.7 K) and after that gradually decreasing in amplitude with the increase in the Co content. The normalized value of the peak position H-p/H-c2 has weak dependence on Co concentration. In the case of MnxNbSe2 the features of the peak effect as a function of the Mn content are different and they can be understood in terms of strong pinning
Guiding superconducting vortices by magnetic domain walls
We demonstrate a unique prospect for inducing anisotropic vortex pinning and
manipulating the directional motion of vortices using the stripe domain
patterns of a uniaxial magnetic film in a the superconducting/ferromagnetic
hybrid. Our observations can be described by a model, which considers
interactions between magnetic charges of vortices and surface magnetic charges
of domains resulting in the enhanced pinning of vortices on domain walls.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figure
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