Stable fractional flux vortices in mesoscopic superconductors

Abstract

Conventional superconductors have vortices carrying integer multiples of magnetic flux quantum while unconventional ones, with p- or d-wave order parameter, allow half-integer fluxes. Here we show that mesoscopic size effects stabilize fractional flux vortices in the thermodynamical ground state of s-wave two-gap superconductors. The value of these fluxes can be an arbitrary fraction of flux quantum and can be measured directly from distributions of magnetic fields on the samples.

4 pages, 4 figures, to be published in Physical Review B

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Cited by in corpus (24)

• Vortex matter in mesoscopic two-gap superconducting disks: influence of Josephson and magnetic coupling
• Skyrmionic state and stable half-quantum vortices in chiral p-wave superconductors
• Stability of fractional vortex states in a two-band mesoscopic superconductor
• Diamond Magnetometry of Superconducting Thin Films
• Ground state, collective mode, phase soliton and vortex in multiband superconductors
• Giant vortices, vortex rings and reentrant behavior in type-1.5 superconductors
• Vortex States and Phase Diagram of Multi-component Superconductors with Competing Repulsive and Attractive Vortex Interactions
• Dissociation Transition of a Composite Lattice of Magnetic Vortices in the Flux-Flow Regime of Two-Band Superconductors
• Vortical versus skyrmionic states in mesoscopic \emph{p}-wave superconductors
• Stabilizing fractional vortices in multiband superconductors with periodic pinning arrays
• Distinct magnetic signatures of fractional vortex configurations in multiband superconductors
• Vortex states in mesoscopic three-band superconductors
• Microscopically derived multi-component Ginzburg-Landau theories for $s+is$ superconducting state
• Comment on Phys. Rev. B 83, 054515 (2011) by V. G. Kogan and J. Schmalian and comment on their reply Phys. Rev. B 86, 016502 (2012)
• Coreless vortices as direct signature of chiral $d$-wave superconductivity
• The Magnetic Structure of Individual Flux Vortices in Superconducting MgB2 Derived using Transmission Electron Microscopy
• Tuning vortex fluctuations and the resistive transition in superconducting films with a thin overlayer
• Robust and tunable coreless vortices and fractional vortices in chiral $d$-wave superconductors
• Topological defects in mixtures of superconducting condensates with different charges
• Diversified vortex phase diagram for a rotating trapped two-band Fermi gas in the BCS-BEC crossover
• Superconductors that do not expel magnetic flux
• Fractional skyrmion and absence of low-lying Andreev bound states in a micro fractional-flux quantum vortex
• Interaction between multi components vortices at arbitrary distances using a variational method in the Ginzburg-Landau theory
• Unconventional and anomalous magnetic field distribution in a bilayer superconductor with geometric constraints