128 research outputs found
Superconducting Vortices and Elliptical Ferromagnetic Textures
In this article an analytical and numerical study of superconducting thin
film with ferromagnetic textures of elliptical geometries in close proximity is
presented. The screening currents induced in the superconductor due to the
magnetic texture are calculated. Close to the superconducting transition
temperature the spontaneous creation of superconducting vortices becomes
energy favorable depending on the value of the magnetization and the
geometrical quantities of the magnetic texture. The creation of vortices by
elliptic dots is more energy favorable than those created by circular ones. The
superconductor covered by elliptic dots array exhibits anisotropic transport
properties.Comment: 4 pages, 5figure
Theory of pinning in a Superconducting Thin Film Pierced by a Ferromagnetic Columnar Defect
This is an analytical study of pinning and spontaneous vortex phase is a
system consisting of a superconducting thin film pierced by a long
ferromagnetic columnar defect of finite radius . The magnetic fields,
screening currents, energy and pinning forces for this system are calculated.
The interaction between the magnetic field of vortices and the magnetization
outside the plane of the film and its close proximity enhances vortex pinning
significantly. Spontaneous vortex phase appears when the magnetization of the
columnar defect is increased above a critical value. Transitions between phases
characterized by different number of flux quanta are also studied. These
results are generalized to the case when the superconductor is pierced by an
array of columnar defects.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures, Accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.
Superconducting Transition Temperature in Heterogeneous Ferromagnet-Superconductor Systems
We study the shift of the the superconducting transition temperature in
ferromagnetic-superconducting bi-layers and in a superconducting film supplied
a square array of ferromagnetic dots. We find that the transition temperature
in these two cases change presumably in opposite direction and that its change
is not too small. We extend these results to multilayer structures. We predict
that rather small external magnetic field Oe can change the
transition temperature of the bilayer by 10% .Comment: 9 pages, 2 figure
Theory of Room Temperature Ferromagnet V(TCNE)_x (1.5 < x < 2): Role of Hidden Flat Bands
Theoretical studies on the possible origin of room temperature ferromagnetism
(ferromagnetic once crystallized) in the molecular transition metal complex,
V(TCNE)_x (1.5<x<2) have been carried out. For this family, there have been no
definite understanding of crystal structure so far because of sample quality,
though the effective valence of V is known to be close to +2. Proposing a new
crystal structure for the stoichiometric case of x=2, where the valence of each
TCNE molecule is -1 and resistivity shows insulating behavior, exchange
interaction among d-electrons on adjacent V atoms has been estimated based on
the cluster with 3 vanadium atoms and one TCNE molecule. It turns out that
Hund's coupling among d orbitals within the same V atoms and antiferromagnetic
coupling between d oribitals and LUMO of TCNE (bridging V atoms) due to
hybridization result in overall ferromagnetism (to be precise, ferrimagnetism).
This view based on localized electrons is supplemented by the band picture,
which indicates the existence of a flat band expected to lead to ferromagnetism
as well consistent with the localized view. The off-stoichiometric cases (x<2),
which still show ferromagnetism but semiconducting transport properties, have
been analyzed as due to Anderson localization.Comment: Accepted for publication in J. Phys. Soc. Jpn. Vol.79 (2010), No. 3
(March issue), in press; 6 pages, 8 figure
Antivortices due to competing orbital and paramagnetic pair-breaking effects
Thermodynamically stable vortex-antivortex structures in a
quasi-two-dimensional superconductor in a tilted magnetic field are predicted.
For this geometry, both orbital and spin pair-breaking effects exist, with
their relative strength depending on the tilt angle \Theta. The spectrum of
possible states contains as limits the ordinary vortex state (for large \Theta)
and the Fulde-Ferrell-Larkin-Ovchinnikov state (for \Theta=0). The
quasiclassical equations are solved near H_{c2} for arbitrary \Theta and it is
shown that stable states with coexisting vortices and antivortices exist in a
small interval close to \Theta=0. The results are compared with recent
predictions of antivortices in mesoscopic samples.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figure
Interaction of mesoscopic magnetic textures with superconductors
Journals published by the American Physical Society can be found at http://journals.aps.org/Here we report a method to calculate the vortex and magnetization arrangement for a system of interacting superconductors and ferromagnets separated in space. The method is based on static London-Maxwell equations and the corresponding energy. Possible superconducting vortices are included in this system. Using this method we analyze screening currents in a superconducting film induced by magnetic textures in a thin magnetic film. We assume that the two films are parallel and positioned close to each to other, but interact exclusively via magnetic fields. We also consider possible vortices within this superconducting film and their interactions with magnetic texture. As an example of such magnetic texture we use a single magnetic dot with magnetization either perpendicular or parallel to the film. We derive a condition where spontaneous formation of one, two, or more vortices and antivortices is energetically favorable. We prove that, in the case of such a circular magnetic dot with perpendicular magnetization, when the vortex emerges in the superconducting film the normal component of magnetic field near the superconducting film changes sign outside of the dot range
Andreev conductance of a domain wall
At low temperatures, the transport through a superconductor-ferromagnet
tunnel interface is due to tunneling of electrons in pairs. Exchange field of a
monodomain ferromagnet aligns electron spins and suppresses the two electron
tunneling. The presence of the domain walls at the SF interface strongly
enhances the subgap current. The Andreev conductance is proven to be
proportional to the total length of domain walls at the SF interface.Comment: 4 pages and 1 figur
Magnetic Pinning of Vortices in a Superconducting Film: The (anti)vortex-magnetic dipole interaction energy in the London approximation
The interaction between a superconducting vortex or antivortex in a
superconducting film and a magnetic dipole with in- or out-of-plane
magnetization is investigated within the London approximation. The dependence
of the interaction energy on the dipole-vortex distance and the film thickness
is studied and analytical results are obtained in limiting cases. We show how
the short range interaction with the magnetic dipole makes the co-existence of
vortices and antivortices possible. Different configurations with vortices and
antivortices are investigated.Comment: 12 pages, 12 figures. Submitted to Phys. Rev.
Phase diagram of a superconductor / ferromagnet bilayer
The magnetic field (H) - temperature (T) phase diagram of a superconductor is
significantly altered when domains are present in an underlying ferromagnet
with perpendicular magnetic anisotropy. When the domains have a band-like
shape, the critical temperature Tc of the superconductor in zero field is
strongly reduced, and the slope of the upper critical field as a function of T
is increased by a factor of 2.4 due to the inhomogeneous stray fields of the
domains. Field compensation effects can cause an asymmetric phase boundary with
respect to H when the ferromagnet contains bubble domains. For a very
inhomogeneous domain structure, Tc~H^2 for low H and Tc~H for higher fields,
indicating a dimensional crossover from a one-dimensional network-like to a
two-dimensional behavior in the nucleation of superconductivity.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figure
Evolutionary Trace Annotation Server: automated enzyme function prediction in protein structures using 3D templates
Summary:The Evolutionary Trace Annotation (ETA) Server predicts enzymatic activity. ETA starts with a structure of unknown function, such as those from structural genomics, and with no prior knowledge of its mechanism uses the phylogenetic Evolutionary Trace (ET) method to extract key functional residues and propose a function-associated 3D motif, called a 3D template. ETA then searches previously annotated structures for geometric template matches that suggest molecular and thus functional mimicry. In order to maximize the predictive value of these matches, ETA next applies distinctive specificity filtersāevolutionary similarity, function plurality and match reciprocity. In large scale controls on enzymes, prediction coverage is 43% but the positive predictive value rises to 92%, thus minimizing false annotations. Users may modify any search parameter, including the template. ETA thus expands the ET suite for protein structure annotation, and can contribute to the annotation efforts of metaservers
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