The phase boundary of superconducting niobium thin films with antidot arrays fabricated with microsphere photolithography

Abstract

The experimental investigation of the $I_c(B)$--$T_c(B)$ phase boundary of superconducting niobium films with large area quasihexagonal hole arrays is reported. The hole arrays were patterned with microsphere photolithography. We investigate the perforated niobium films by means of electrical directed current transport measurements close to the transition temperature $T_c$ in perpendicularly applied magnetic fields. We find pronounced modulations of the critcal current with applied magnetic field, which we interpret as a consequence of commensurable states between the Abrikosov vortex lattice and the quasihexagonal pinning array. Furthermore, we observe Little-Parks oscillations in the critical temperature vs magnetic field.

References in corpus (5)

• Commensurability effects in superconducting Nb films with quasiperiodic pinning arrays
• Improving the performance of superconducting microwave resonators in magnetic fields
• Reducing vortex losses in superconducting microwave resonators with microsphere patterned antidot arrays
• Enhancing the critical current in quasiperiodic pinning arrays below and above the matching magnetic flux
• Commensurability Effects at Nonmatching Fields for Vortices in Diluted Periodic Pinning Arrays

Cited by in corpus (4)

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• Origin of Matching Effect in Anti-dot Array of Superconducting NbN Thin Films
• Paramagnetic excited vortex states in superconductors