Department of Physics BMSIT

Superconductors
Question and answers

1. Write a note on Maglev Vehicles

Ans: Magnetically levitated vehicles
Carriage
Wheels are called Maglev vehicles. These
vehicles consists a carriage inside
Superconducting
magnet
which superconducting magnets

Electro magnet
built into its base which are fitted
with retractable wheels. There is an
aluminum guide-way on which the carriage moves, which can be converted as magnet by
passing current. The maglev moves like an aeroplane i.e., while starting and stopping only the
wheels come in contact to guide way. While running, the vehicle will be levitated because of
the enormous magnetic repulsive force caused between the guide way and superconducting
magnet and during this process friction is eliminated because there is no contact between
moving vehicle and stationary guide-way. As result of this Maglev can attain a very high
speed with less consumption of energy.

2. Discuss Meissner effect.

Ans: A superconducting material kept in a magnetic field expels the magnetic flux out of its
body when it is cooled below the critical temperature and thus behaves as perfect
diamagnetic. This effect is called Meissner effect.

Expulsion of
B≠0 Superconductor B=0 flux from the
material

T < Tc
T > Tc

3. Distinguish between Type I and Type II superconductors.

Ans: Based on the strength of the critical field, superconductors are classified as Type I and
Type II superconductors.

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Type I superconductors:
Type I superconductors are the materials
which exhibits complete Meissner effect. When the

-M
external magnetic field H is less than the critical
(Magnetic Normal state
field Hc, the material in superconducting state and
Moment) Supercon-
ducting is a perfect diamagnetic. As soon as the applied
state
Hc field H exceeds Hc, the entire material becomes
Applied Magnetic field

normal conductor by losing its diamagnetic
property completely. The Hc value of type I semiconductors are found be very low. Therefore
these materials cannot be used in construction of superconducting magnets.
Example: Hg, Pb, Al, Mo, Ti, W, In, etc.
Type II superconductor:

Magnetic
moment Vortex state
Supercond Superconducting
ucting state + normal state Normal state
Hc1 Hc2
Applied Magnetic field

These materials are characterized by two magnetic fields H c1 and H c2 . When applied

magnetic field is less than H c1 , the materials behave as a perfect diamagnetic and as magnetic

field exceeds H c1 , the flux starts to penetrate partially in the material but it does not loses its

property of superconductivity, until the field reaches H c2 . The flux penetration goes on

increasing and as soon as it reaches or becomes greater than H c2 , the material turns into a

normal conductor and flux completely fills in the body. The values of magnetic field H c1 and

H c2 are called the ‘lower critical field’ and ‘upper critical field’ respectively. When the

applied field strength is in between H c1 and H c2 the material is in mixed state and is called as

‘Vortex state’.
In vortex state when H > H c1 flux penetration occurs through some channelized part

of body called ‘filaments’, where these filaments are the parts of the superconducting
material which are converted into their normal state. As field value increases the filaments

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number also increases till H = H c2 . When H ≥ H c2 these filaments spread in to the entire

body and material becomes a normal conductor. Since upper critical field H c2 of type II

superconductor is very high when compare to critical field Hc of type I, they are used in
superconducting magnets.
Example: Nb3Ge, NbTi, etc.
4. What is Meissner effect? Explain the BCS theory of Superconductors.
Ans: A superconducting material kept in a magnetic field expels the magnetic flux out of its
body when it is cooled below the critical temperature and thus behaves as perfect
diamagnetic. This effect is called Meissner effect.

Expulsion of
B≠0 Superconductor B=0 flux from the
material

T < Tc
T > Tc
BCS theory:

Bardeen, Cooper and Schrieffer gave a theory in 1957 to explain the phenomenon of
superconductivity, which is known as BCS theory. BCS theory is a quantum mechanical
concept which is based on the formation of cooper pairs inside the super conductor.

When current flows in a superconductor, and an electron comes in the vicinity of a

positive ion, due to opposite charges, a force of attraction develops between them. Because of
this interaction the positive ion gets slightly displaced from its former position. This is known
as lattice distortion. The distortion of lattice emits a field called phonon field. The electron
gets interacts with this phonon field because of its opposite charge. Now another electron
which comes near to this place will also interacts with the distorted lattice. This process is
now looked upon as equivalent to interaction between the two electrons via the phonon field.
According to quantum theory, such interactions take place between only those electrons
having equal and opposite spins and opposite momentum. Such pair of electrons which forms
in presence of phonon as mediator is called cooper pair. According to Cooper, the force of
attraction between electrons will exceed the coulombian force of repulsion, when temperature

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is below the critical temperature. The cooper pair can be represented as shown below.
(Cooper pair sketch refer class notes)

According to the quantum mechanical rules the copper pair is treated as a single entity
and the wave function associated with these Cooper pairs extends over a fairly large volume.
The wave functions associated with cooper pair can influence the other Cooper pairs and this
overlapping extends over 106 pairs which results in a strong correlation in their motion such
that one can aid the motion of the other. This results in an effect equivalent to the entire union
of electrons moving as a single unit. The resistance encountered by any single Copper pair is
simply overcome by the co-operative action of other pairs in the union. Thus, when the
electrons flow collectively in the form of Cooper pairs in superconducting materials, they do
not encounter any scattering and the resistance factor vanishes or, in other words,
conductivity becomes infinity which is named as superconductivity.
5. What is superconductivity? Describe Type I and Type II superconductors.

Ans: Superconductivity is the phenomena in which resistance of some materials drops to zero
when they are cooled to very low temperature of the order of zero Kelvin. The temperature at
which the resistance disappears is called the transition temperature or critical temperature
(Tc). A current can pass through it without altering its value. This phenomenon is known as
superconductivity and the substance showing this property is called superconductor.

Type I superconductors:
Type I superconductors are the materials
which exhibits complete Meissner effect. When the

-M
external magnetic field H is less than the critical
(Magnetic Normal state
field Hc, the material in superconducting state and
Moment) Supercon-
ducting is a perfect diamagnetic. As soon as the applied
state
Hc field H exceeds Hc, the entire material becomes
Applied Magnetic field

normal conductor by losing its diamagnetic

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property completely. The Hc value of type I semiconductors are found be very low. Therefore
these materials cannot be used in construction of superconducting magnets.
Example: Hg, Pb, Al, Mo, Ti, W, In, etc.
Type II superconductor:

Magnetic
moment Vortex state
Supercond Superconducting
ucting state + normal state Normal state
Hc1 Hc2
Applied Magnetic field

These materials are characterized by two magnetic fields H c1 and H c2 . When applied

magnetic field is less than H c1 , the materials behave as a perfect diamagnetic and as magnetic

field exceeds H c1 , the flux starts to penetrate partially in the material but it does not loses its

property of superconductivity, until the field reaches H c2 . The flux penetration goes on

increasing and as soon as it reaches or becomes greater than H c2 , the material turns into a

normal conductor and flux completely fills in the body. The values of magnetic field H c1 and

H c2 are called the ‘lower critical field’ and ‘upper critical field’ respectively. When the

applied field strength is in between H c1 and H c2 the material is in mixed state and is called as

‘Vortex state’.
In vortex state when H > H c1 flux penetration occurs through some channelized part

of body called ‘filaments’, where these filaments are the parts of the superconducting
material which are converted into their normal state. As field value increases the filaments
number also increases till H = H c2 . When H ≥ H c2 these filaments spread in to the entire

body and material becomes a normal conductor. Since upper critical field H c2 of type II

superconductor is very high when compare to critical field Hc of type I, they are used in
superconducting magnets.
Example: Nb3Ge, NbTi, etc.

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6. Write a note on High Temperature superconductivity.

Ans: High temperatures superconductors are also called high-Tc material are the
superconducting materials having high critical temperature of the order of 30K. They are all
made up of different types of oxides of copper having structure of Pervoskite crystals. Here
the conductivity depends on the number of copper-oxygen layers in structure unit. Adding
copper-oxide layers into structure unit brings Tc to higher values.
The other important observation is that, the formation of supercurrents in high-Tc
superconductors is direction dependent and is strong in copper-oxygen planes and weak in
perpendicular direction to it. The conductivity in this material is not because of the motion of
cooper pairs exactly, but because of the motion of the pairs of electrons which resemble the
cooper pair. These are used for the construction of superconducting magnets for the
generation of high magnetic fields.
Example: (refer notes)
7. What is critical magnetic field? Discuss the effect of critical magnetic field on
superconductivity.

Critical field [Hc]: When a sufficient strong magnetic field is applied to a superconductor
below critical temperature, its superconducting property is destroyed. The minimum strength
of magnetic field required to just switch a superconducting material from superconducting
state to normal state is called critical field.

However it is found that, the superconducting state can be retained by decreasing the
temperature of the material. Thus the effect of critical magnetic field is found to decrease the
transition temperature. The variation of critical field with respect to critical temperature is as
shown below.

Hc0

H Super
conductor Normal conductor
ctor

T (K) Tc

 T2 
The relation between Hc and Tc is given by, H c = H 0 1 − 2 
 Tc 

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Where, H0 – is the critical field at zero Kelvin and Tc – the critical temperature.

8. Write a note on superconducting magnets.

Ans: These are the magnets which can generate very high magnetic fields. In this we use the
wires made up of the alloys Nb3Sn and Nb-Zn which are type II superconductors, in the form
of solenoids. Since formation of wires by using above mentioned material is not so practical,
we make these materials to lie as filaments embedded in a copper matrix (by using certain
kind of material processing). This kind of arrangement is help full for the superconducting
material to with stand the external stress such as, radially outward force because of opposite
direction of currents along diameter in a loop and attractive force in adjacent turns because of
same direction of currents. By keeping the temperature of the solenoid below Tc and pass a
very high currents of several hundred amperes through solenoid we can produce a magnetic
field of about 15 tesla. These superconducting magnets are used in Magnetic Resonance
Imaging (MRI) to generate the images of cross-section of body.