Bose glass melting and the transverse Meissner effect in YBa_2Cu_3O_(7-δ) single crystals

Abstract

We map out the phase boundary separating the vortex solid and liquid phases in YBa_2Cu_3O_(7-δ) (YBCO) single crystals with irradiation-induced columnar defects. These randomly distributed, extended defects are expected to localize vortices into a "Bose glass" phase. The transition from the vortex liquid into the Bose glass is predicted to exhibit two fundamental signatures: a vanishing of the linear resistivity and, concomitantly, a screening of de magnetic fields applied perpendicular to the defect axis, the transverse Meissner effect. We have investigated both aspects by systematic measurements on two YBCO single crystals with different defect densities (matching fields of 0.25 and 0.5 T), as well as on an unirradiated control sample. The melting line determined by the temperature, T_m, of vanishing resistance undergoes a 30% decrease in slope as the magnetic field is ramped through the matching field. This is evidence that interstitial vortices are pinned much more weakly than originally thought. If we associate the melting temperature with the Bose glass transition temperature, we obtain static critical exponents of ν⊥=1.7±0.2 and ν⊥=1.9±0.1 for the crystals with matching fields of 0.25 and 0.5 T, respectively. Simultaneously, we use a ten-element, linear array of microfabricated Hall probe magnetometers to observe directly the flux screening associated with the transverse Meissner state. We find the temperature above which the Meissner state breaks down, T_s, to decrease linearly as the magnetic field applied perpendicular to the columnar defect axis increases. This linear trend, found in both irradiated crystals to cover a range of at least 40 K in T_s, is closely in line with the current theoretical expectation ν⊥≃1. However, already for angles as small as one degree, T_s(H⊥) falls below T_m(H⊥) by more than 10 K. Thus, between Ts(H⊥) and T_m(H⊥) we observe a large regime characterized by zero resistivity in the absence of a transverse Meissner effect: vortices remain effectively localized even when rotated off the columnar defects.

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