No Arabic abstract
Interfacing superconductors with strongly spin-polarized magnetic materials opens the possibility to discover new spintronic devices in which spin-triplet Cooper pairs play a key role. Motivated by the recent derivation of spin-polarized quasiclassical boundary conditions capable of describing such a scenario in the diffusive limit, we consider the emergent physics in hybrid structures comprised of a conventional s-wave superconductor (e.g. Nb, Al) and either strongly spin-polarized ferromagnetic insulators (e.g. EuO, GdN) or halfmetallic ferromagnets (e.g. CrO2, LCMO). In contrast to most previous works, we focus on how the superconductor itself is influenced by the proximity effect, and how the generated triplet Cooper pairs manifest themselves in the self-consistently computed density of states (DOS) and the superconducting critical temperature Tc. We provide a comprehensive treatment of how the superconductor and its properties are affected by the triplet pairs, demonstrating that our theory can reproduce the recent observation of an unusually large zero-energy peak in a superconductor interfaced with a half-metal, which even exceeds the normal-state DOS. We also discuss the recent observation of a large superconducting spin-valve effect with a Tc change ~1K in superconductor/half-metal structures, in which case our results indicate that the experiment cannot be explained fully by a long-ranged triplet proximity effect.
We theoretically study the magnetization inside a normal metal induced in an s-wave superconductor/ferromagnetic metal/normal metal/ferromagnetic metal/s-wave superconductor (S/F1/N/F2/S) Josephson junction. Using quasiclassical Greens function method, we show that the magnetization becomes finite inside N. The origin of this magnetization is due to odd-frequency spin-triplet Cooper pairs formed by electrons of equal and opposite spins, which are induced by proximity effect in the S/F1/N/F2/S junction. We find that the magnetization M(d,q) in N can be decomposed into two parts, M(d,q)=MI(d)+MII(d,q), where q is the superconducting phase difference between two Ss and d is the thickness of N. MI(d) exists generally in S/F junctions, while MII(d,q) carries all q dependence and represents the fingerprint of phase coherence between two Ss in Josephson junctions. The q dependence thus allows us to control the magnetization in N by tuning q for a fixed d. We show that MI(d) weakly decreases with increasing d, while the q dependent magnetization MII(d,q) rapidly decays with d. Moreover, we find that the time-averaged magnetization <MII(d,q)> exhibits discontinuous peak at each resonance DC voltage Vn=nhw_S/2e(n: integer) when DC voltage V as well as AC voltage v_ac(t) with frequency w_S are both applied to the S/F1/N/F2/S junction. This is because MII(d,q) oscillates generally in time t (AC magnetization) with dq/dt=2e[V+v_ac(t)]/h and thus <MII(d,q)>=0, but can be converted into the time-independent DC magnetization for DC voltage at Vn. We also discuss that the magnetization induced in N can be measurably large in realistic systems. Therefore, the measurement of the induced magnetization serves as an alternative way to detect the phase coherence between two Ss in Josephson junctions. Our results also provide a basic concept for tunable magnetization in superconducting spintronics devices.
We discuss the Josephson effect in strongly spin-polarized ferromagnets where triplet correlations are induced by means of spin-active interface scattering, extending our earlier work [Phys. Rev. Lett. 102, 227005 (2009)] by including impurity scattering in the ferromagnetic bulk and the inverse proximity effect in a fully self-consistent way. Our quasiclassical approach accounts for the differences of Fermi momenta and Fermi velocities between the two spin bands of the ferromagnet, and thereby overcomes an important short-coming of previous work within the framework of Usadel theory. We show that non-magnetic disorder in conjunction with spin-dependent Fermi velocities may induce a reversal of the spin-current as a function of temperature.
A microscopic theory for the spin triplet Cooper pairing in non-centrosymmetric superconductors like CePt_3Si and CeTSi_3 (T=Rh, Ir) is presented. The lack of inversion symmetry leads to new anomalous spin fluctuations which stabilize the triplet part in addition to the singlet part originating from the centrosymmetric spin fluctuations. It is shown that both parts have similar nontrivial momentum dependence of A_1 type. Therefore the mixed singlet-triplet gap function has accidental line nodes on both Fermi surface sheets which are stable as function of temperature. This gap function explains the salient features of CePt_3Si and CeTSi_3 superconductors.
Superconductivity arises from two distinct quantum phenomena: electron pairing and long-range phase coherence. In conventional superconductors, the two quantum phenomena generally take place simultaneously, while the electron pairing occurs at higher temperature than the long-range phase coherence in the underdoped high-Tc cuprate superconductors. Recently, whether electron pairing is also prior to long-range phase coherence in single-layer FeSe film on SrTiO3 substrate is under debate. Here, by measuring Knight shift and nuclear spin-lattice relaxation rate, we unambiguously reveal a pseudogap behavior below Tp ~ 60 K in two layered FeSe-based superconductors with quasi-two-dimension. In the pseudogap regime, a weak diamagnetic signal and a remarkable Nernst effect are also observed, which indicate that the observed pseudogap behavior is related to superconducting fluctuations. These works confirm that strong phase fluctuation is an important character in the two-dimensional iron-based superconductors as widely observed in high-Tc cuprate superconductors.
We address the origin of the Cooper pairs in high-$T_c$ cuprates and the unique nature of the superconducting (SC) condensate. Itinerant holes in an antiferromagnetic background form pairs spontaneously, without any `glue, defining a new quantum object the `pairon. In the incoherent pseudogap phase, above $T_c$ or within the vortex core, the pairon binding energies are distributed statistically, forming a `Cooper-pair glass. Contrary to conventional SC, it is the mutual pair-pair interaction that is responsable for the condensation. We give a natural explanation for the {it ergodic rigidity} of the excitation gap, being uniquely determined by the carrier concentration $p$ and $J$. The phase diagram can be understood, without spin fluctuations, in terms of a single energy scale $sim J$, the exchange energy at the metal-insulator transition.