Evolution of the fishtail-effect in pure and Ag-doped MG-YBCO

We report on magnetic measurements carried out in a textured YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{7-\delta}$ and YBa$_2$(Cu$_{1-x}$Ag$_x$)$_3$O$_{7-\delta}$ (at $x \approx$ 0.02) crystals. The so-called fishtail-effect (FE) or second magnetization peak has been observed in a wide temperature range 0.4~$<T/T_c<$~0.8 for $\textbf{H}\parallel c$. The origin of the FE arises for the competition between surface barrier and bulk pinning. This is confirmed in a non-monotonically behavior of the relaxation rate $R$. The value $H_{max}$ for Ag-doped crystals is larger than for the pure one due to the presence of additional pinning centers, above all on silver atoms.Comment: 6 pages, 6 figure

Anisotropic shift of the irreversibility line by neutron irradiation

The irreversibility line of high-{Tc} superconductors is shifted considerably by irradiating the material with fast neutrons. The anisotropic and non-monotonous shift is qualitatively explained by a simple model based on an interaction between three pinning mechanisms, the intrinsic pinning by the ab-planes, the weak pinning by the pre-irradiation defect structure, and strong pinning by neutron induced defect cascades. A correlation between the cascade density and the position of the irreversibility line is observed

Fast neutron irradiation effects on magnetization relaxation in YBCO single crystals

A high-quality YBa{sub 2}Cu{sub 3}O{sub 7-{delta}} single crystal has been investigated by torque magnetometry prior to and following fast neutron irradiation to a fluence of 2{times}10{sup 21} m{sup {minus}2} (E > 0.1 MeV). In addition to large enhancements of the critical current densities, which have been observed in similar form previously by Sauerzopf et al, we find a dramatic change in the relaxation behavior following irradiation. At low temperatures ({le} 50 k) the relaxation rates are lowered by factors up to 4 in the irradiated state in a magnetic field of 1.5 T. At higher temperatures, on the other hand, they are enhanced compared to the unirradiated state. Both before and after irradiation, the magnetization relaxation follows a logarithmic time dependence, which we ascribe to thermally activated flux motion