First-Order Transition and Critical End-Point in Vortex Liquids in Layered Superconductors

Abstract

We calculate various thermodynamic quantities of vortex liquids in a layered superconductor by using the nonperturbative parquet approximation method, which was previously used to study the effect of thermal fluctuations in two-dimensional vortex systems. We find there is a first-order transition between two vortex liquid phases which differ in the magnitude of their correlation lengths. As the coupling between the layers increases,the first-order transition line ends at a critical point. We discuss the possible relation between this critical end-point and the disappearance of the first-order transition which is observed in experiments on high temperature superconductors at low magnetic fields.

9 pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (1)

• Numerical studies of the phase diagram of layered type II superconductors in a magnetic field

Cited by in corpus (5)

• The Ginzburg-Landau Theory of Type II superconductors in magnetic field
• Solving the Parquet Equations for the Hubbard Model beyond Weak Coupling
• The Absence of Vortex Lattice Melting in a Conventional Superconductor
• An Improved Nonperturbative Method for Studying Two-dimensional Vortex Liquids
• Liquid-to-liquid phase transition in pancake vortex systems