Andreev Reflection and Spin Injection into $s-$ and $d-$wave Superconductors

Abstract

We study the effect of spin injection into $s-$ and $d-$wave superconductors, with an emphasis on the interplay between boundary and bulk spin transport properties. The quantities of interest include the amount of non-equilibrium magnetization ($m$), as well as the induced spin-dependent current ($I_s$) and boundary voltage ($V_s$). In general, the Andreev reflection makes each of the three quantities depend on a different combination of the boundary and bulk contributions. The situation simplifies either for half-metallic ferromagnets or in the strong barrier limit, where both $V_s$ and $m$ depend solely on the bulk spin transport/relaxation properties. The implications of our results for the on-going spin injection experiments in high $T_c$ cuprates are discussed.

4 pages, REVTEX, 1 figure included; typos corrected

References in corpus (3)

• Spin current in ferromagnet/insulator/superconductor junctions
• Spin polarized tunneling in ferromagnet/unconventional superconductor junctions
• Spin Injection into a Luttinger Liquid

Cited by in corpus (6)

• Extrinsic Magnetotransport Phenomena in Ferromagnetic Oxides
• Andreev - Saint James reflections: a probe of cuprate superconductors
• Tunneling spectroscopy for ferromagnet/superconductor junctions
• Spin-polarized quasiparticle transport in cuprate superconductors
• Probing spin-charge separation using spin transport
• Critical current of a superconductor measured via injection of spin polarized carriers