Size-induced depression of first-order transition lines and entropy-jump in extremely-layered nanocrystalline vortex matter

Abstract

We detect the persistence of the solidification and order-disorder first-order transition lines in the phase diagram of nanocrystalline Bi${}_2$Sr${}_2$CaCu${}_2$O${}_8$ vortex matter down to a system size of less than hundred vortices. The temperature-location of the vortex solidification transition line is not altered by decreasing the sample size although there is a depletion of the entropy-jump at the transition with respect to macroscopic vortex matter. The solid order-disorder phase transition field moves upward on decreasing the system size due to the increase of the surface-to-volume ratio of vortices entailing a decrease on the average vortex binding energy.

4 pages, 4 figures

References in corpus (2)

• Latent-heat and non-linear vortex liquid at the vicinity of the first-order phase transition in layered high-Tc superconductors
• Geometrical confinement effects in layered mesoscopic vortex-matter

Cited by in corpus (8)

• Hyperuniform vortex patterns at the surface of type-II superconductors
• Oscillating paramagnetic Meissner effect and Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless transition in $B{i}_{2}S{r}_{2}CaC{u}_2{O}_{8+\delta }$ monolayer
• Excess of topological defects induced by confinement in vortex nanocrystals
• Finite-size effects in hyperuniform vortex matter
• Enhancement of penetration field in vortex nanocrystals due to Andreev bound states
• Second ac screening step as a probe for the first-order melting transition in layered vortex matter at intermediate temperatures
• Bridge in micron-sized Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+y sample act as converging lens for vortices
• Detection of discretized single-shell penetration in mesoscopic vortex matter