Vortex States of a Superconducting Film from a Magnetic Dot Array

Using Ginzburg-Landau theory, we find novel configurations of vortices in superconducting thin films subject to the magnetic field of a magnetic dot array, with dipole moments oriented perpendicular to the film. Sufficiently strong magnets cause the formation of vortex-antivortex pairs. In most cases, the vortices are confined to dot regions, while the antivortices can form a rich variety of lattice states. We propose an experiment in which the perpendicular component of the dot dipole moments can be tuned using an in-plane magnetic field. We show that in such an experiment the vortex-antivortex pair density shows broad plateaus as a function of the dipole strength. Many of the plateaus correspond to vortex configurations which break dot lattice symmetries. In some of these states, the vortex cores are strongly distorted. Possible experimental consequences are mentioned.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Critical behavior of diluted magnetic semiconductors: the apparent violation and the eventual restoration of the Harris criterion for all regimes of disorder

Using large-scale Monte Carlo calculations, we consider strongly disordered Heisenberg models on a cubic lattice with missing sites (as in diluted magnetic semiconductors such as Ga_{1-x}Mn_{x}As). For disorder ranging from weak to strong levels of dilution, we identify Curie temperatures and calculate the critical exponents nu, gamma, eta, and beta finding, per the Harris criterion, good agreement with critical indices for the pure Heisenberg model where there is no disorder component. Moreover, we find that thermodynamic quantities (e.g. the second moment of the magnetization per spin) self average at the ferromagnetic transition temperature with relative fluctuations tending to zero with increasing system size. We directly calculate effective critical exponents for T > T_{c}, yielding values which may differ significantly from the critical indices for the pure system, especially in the presence of strong disorder. Ultimately, the difference is only apparent, and eventually disappears when T is very close to T_{c}.Comment: 11 pages, 9 figure

Magnetic Percolation and the Phase Diagram of the Disordered RKKY model

We consider ferromagnetism in spatially randomly located magnetic moments, as in a diluted magnetic semiconductor, coupled via the carrier-mediated indirect exchange RKKY interaction. We obtain via Monte Carlo the magnetic phase diagram as a function of the impurity moment density $n_{i}$ and the relative carrier concentration $n_{c}/n_{i}$. As evidenced by the diverging correlation length and magnetic susceptibility, the boundary between ferromagnetic (FM) and non-ferromagnetic (NF) phases constitutes a line of zero temperature critical points which can be viewed as a magnetic percolation transition. In the dilute limit, we find that bulk ferromagnetism vanishes for $n_{c}/n_{i}>.1$. We also incorporate the local antiferromagnetic direct superexchange interaction between nearest neighbor impurities, and examine the impact of a damping factor in the RKKY range function.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figures; figure formatting modified, typos fixe