No Arabic abstract
Traces of superconductivity (SC) at elevated temperatures (up to 65 K) were observed by magnetic measurements in three different inhomogeneous sulfur doped amorphous carbon (a-C) systems: (a) in commercial and (b) synthesized powders and (c) in a-C thin films. (a) Studies performed on commercial (a-C) powder which contains 0.21% of sulfur, revealed traces of non-percolated superconducting phases below Tc = 65 K. The SC volume fraction is enhanced by the sulfur doping. (b) a-C powder obtained by pyrolytic decomposition of sucrose did not show any sign for SC above 5 K. This powder was mixed with sulfur and synthesized at 400 C (a-CS). The inhomogeneous products obtained, show traces of SC phases at TC= 17 and 42 K. (c) Non-superconducting composite a-C-W thin films were grown by electron-beam induced deposition. SC emerged at Tc = 34.4 K only after heat treatment with sulfur. Other parts of the pyrolytic a-CS powder, show unusual magnetic features. (i) Pronounced irreversible peaks around 55-75 K appear in the first zero-field-cooled (ZFC) sweep only. Their origin is not known. (ii) Unexpectedly these peaks are totally suppressed in the second ZFC runs measured a few minutes later. (iii) Around the peak position the field-cooled (FC) curves cross the ZFC plots (ZFC>FC). These peculiar magnetic observations also ascribed to a-CS powder prepared from the commercial a-C powder and are connected to each other. All SC and magnetic phenomena observed are intrinsic properties of the sulfur doped a-C materials. It is proposed that the a-CS systems behave similarly to well known high TC curates and/or pnictides in which SC emerges from magnetic states.
Following our previous investigations on superconductivity in amorphous carbon (aC) based systems; we have prepared thin composite aC-W films using electron-beam induced deposition. The films did not show any sign for superconductivity above 5 K. However, local, non-percolative, superconductivity emerged at Tc = 34.4 K after treatment with sulfur at 250 C for 24 hours. The superconducting features in the magnetization curves were by far sharper compared to our previous results, and the shielding fraction increased by about an order of magnitude. Our data suggest that pairing and localized superconductivity take place in the aC-S regions, whereas phase coherence, assisted by the W inclusions, was enhanced compared to our previous samples, yet still not to the degree of achieving global phase-coherence and percolating superconductivity.
In this article, we examine the superconducting properties of low- and high-$T_c$ magnetic superconductors in magnetic fields close to the first penetration field. Attention is paid to the properties that relate to the interactions between antiferromagnetism and superconductivity. It is suggested that several features characterizing the interplay between magnetic and superconducting subsystems in low-$T_c$ superconductors can also be present in high-$T_c$ materials, however, they have not been observed for any non-substituted antiferromagnetic superconductors of the Y123 type. For the Gd$_{1+x}$Ba$_{2-x}$Cu$_3$O$_{7-delta}$ compound, a peak in the temperature dependence of the ac susceptibility has been found for $x = 0.2$ near the N{e}el temperature of the Gd sublattice. This peak is attributed to the suppression of superconducting persistent currents due to the pair breaking effect that results from the enhanced magnetic fluctuations in the vicinity of the phase transition temperature. This observation indicates that the interaction between magnetic and conducting electrons is present for the composition with $x = 0.2$, where magnetism is enhanced and superconductivity diminished.
Among the large variety of two-dimensional (2D) materials discovered to date, elemental monolayers that host superconductivity are very rare. Using ab initio calculations we show that recently synthesized gallium monolayers, coined gallenene, are intrinsically superconducting through electron-phonon coupling. We reveal that Ga-100 gallenene, a planar monolayer isostructural with graphene, is the structurally simplest 2D superconductor to date, furthermore hosting topological edge states due to its honeycomb structure. Our anisotropic Eliashberg calculations show distinctly three-gap superconductivity in Ga-100, in contrast to the alternative buckled Ga-010 gallenene which presents a single anisotropic superconducting gap. Strikingly, the critical temperature ($T_c$) of gallenene is in the range of $7-10$ K, exceeding the $T_c$ of bulk gallium from which it is exfoliated. Finally we explore chemical functionalization of gallenene with hydrogen, and report induced multigap superconductivity with an enhanced $T_c$ in the resulting gallenane compound.
We present an extensive study of the time dependence of the magnetization in a polycrystalline and low temperature charge ordered La0.5Ca0.5MnO3 sample. After application and removal of a 5 T magnetic field, a systematic variation of the magnetic relaxation rate from 10 K to 245 K was found. At 195 K, the magnetization decreases in a very short time and after that it increases slowly as a function of time. Moreover, between 200 and 245 K, an increase in magnetization, above the corresponding value just after removing the 5 T magnetic field, was measured. This unusual behavior was tested in several other relaxation procedures. PACS: 70, 74.25 Ha, 75.60.-d, 76.60.Es
We have carried out a systematic magnetic relaxation study, measured after applying and switching off a 5 T magnetic field to polycrystalline samples of La0.5Ca0.5MnO3 and Nd0.5Sr0.5MnO3. The long time logarithmic relaxation rate (LTLRR), decreased from 10 K to 150 K and increased from 150 K to 195 K in La0.5Ca0.5MnO3. This change in behavior was found to be related to the complete suppression of the antiferromagnetic phase above 150 K and in the presence of a 5 T magnetic field. At 195 K, the magnetization first decreased, and after a few minutes increased slowly as a function of time. Moreover, between 200 K and 245 K, the magnetization increased throughout the measured time span. The change in the slope of the curves, from negative to positive at about 200 K was found to be related to the suppression of antiferromagnetic fluctuations in small magnetic fields. A similar temperature dependence of the LTLRR was found for the Nd0.5Sr0.5MnO3 sample. However, the temperature where the LTLRR reached the minimum in Nd0.5Sr0.5MnO3 was lower than that of La0.5Ca0.5MnO3. This result agrees with the stronger ferromagnetic interactions that exist in Nd0.5Sr0.5MnO3 in comparison to La0.5Ca0.5MnO3. The above measurements suggested that the general temperature dependence of the LTLRR and the underlying physics were mainly independent of the particular charge ordering system considered. All relaxation curves could be fitted using a logarithmic law at long times. This slow relaxation was attributed to the coexistence of ferromagnetic and antiferromagnetic interactions between Mn ions, which produced a distribution of energy barriers.