Direct observation of vortices in an array of holes at low temperature: temperature dependance and first visualization of localized superconductivity

A scanning micro superconducting quantum interference device (microSQUID) microscope is used to directly image vortices in a superconducting Al thin film. We observe the temperature dependence of the vortex distribution in a regular defect (hole) array patterned into the Al film. The first direct observation of the localized superconducting state around the holes is shown as well as the effect of the hole size on nucleation of the superconducting state

Nonlinear Convection in Reaction-diffusion Equations under dynamical boundary conditions

We investigate blow-up phenomena for positive solutions of nonlinear reaction-diffusion equations including a nonlinear convection term $\partial_t u = \Delta u - g(u) \cdot \nabla u + f(u)$ in a bounded domain of $\mathbb{R}^N$ under the dissipative dynamical boundary conditions $\sigma \partial_t u + \partial_\nu u =0$. Some conditions on $g$ and $f$ are discussed to state if the positive solutions blow up in finite time or not. Moreover, for certain classes of nonlinearities, an upper-bound for the blow-up time can be derived and the blow-up rate can be determinated.Comment: 20 page

Conductance statistics in small insulating GaAs:Si wires at low temperature. II. Experimental study

We have observed reproducible conductance fluctuations at low temperature in a small GaAs:Si wire driven across the Anderson transition by the application of a gate voltage. We analyse quantitatively the log-normal conductance statistics in terms of truncated quantum fluctuations. Quantum fluctuations due to small changes of the electron energy (controlled by the gate voltage) cannot develop fully due to identified geometrical fluctuations of the resistor network describing the hopping through the sample. The evolution of the fluctuations versus electron energy and magnetic field shows that the fluctuations are non-ergodic, except in the critical insulating region of the Anderson transition, where the localization length is larger than the distance between Si impurities. The mean magnetoconductance is in good accordance with simulations based on the Forward-Directed-Paths analysis, i.e. it saturates to ${\rm ln} (\sigma (H>1)/\sigma (0))\simeq 1,$ as $\sigma (0)$ decreases over orders of magnitude in the strongly localized regime.Comment: Email contact: [email protected]

Scanning microSQUID Force Microscope

A novel scanning probe technique is presented: Scanning microSQUID Force microscopy (SSFM). The instrument features independent topographic and magnetic imaging. The SSFM operates in a dilution refrigerator in cryogenic vacuum. Sample and probe can be cooled to 0.45 K. The probe consists of a microSQUID placed at the edge of a silicon chip attached to a quartz tuning fork. A topographic vertical resolution of 0.02 micrometer is demonstrated and magnetic flux as weak as $10^{-3} \Phi_{0}$ is resolved with a 1 micrometer diameter microSQUID loop.Comment: submitted to Review of Scientific Instrument

Study of First-Order Thermal Sigma-Delta Architecture for Convective Accelerometers

This paper presents the study of an original closed-loop conditioning approach for fully-integrated convective inertial sensors. The method is applied to an accelerometer manufactured on a standard CMOS technology using an auto-aligned bulk etching step. Using the thermal behavior of the sensor as a summing function, a first order sigma-delta modulator is built. This "electro-physical" modulator realizes an analog-to-digital conversion of the signal. Besides the feedback scheme should improve the sensor performance.Comment: Submitted on behalf of EDA Publishing Association (http://irevues.inist.fr/handle/2042/16838