Field-free superconducting diode in a magnetically nanostructured superconductor

Abstract

A strong superconducting diode effect (SDE) is revealed in a thin superconducting film periodically nanostructured with magnetic dots. The SDE is caused by the current-activated dissipation mitigated by vortex-antivortex pairs (VAPs), which periodically nucleate under the dots, move and annihilate in the superconductor - eventually driving the system to the high-resistive state. Inversing the polarity of the applied current destimulates the nucleation of VAPs, the system remains superconducting up to far larger currents, leading to the pronounced diodic response. Our dissipative Ginzburg-Landau simulations detail the involved processes, and provide reliable geometric and parametric ranges for the experimental realization of such a non-volatile superconducting diode, which operates in absence of any applied magnetic field while being fluxonic by design.

9 pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (5)

• Dipole-induced vortex ratchets in superconducting films with arrays of micromagnets
• Skyrmion-(Anti)Vortex Coupling in a Chiral Magnet-Superconductor Heterostructure
• Reversible Ratchet Effects for Vortices in Conformal Pinning Arrays
• Effect of hexagonal patterned arrays and defect geometry on the critical current of superconducting films
• Reversible ratchet effects in a narrow superconducting ring