SUPERCONDUCTIVITY

The sudden disappearance of electrical

resistance in a material below a certain
temperature is known as superconductivity.The
material that exhibit superconductivity is called
superconductor.The temperature at which a
normal material turns into a superconductor is
called critical temperatures Tc .Every
superconductor has its own critical temperature
at which it passes over into the superconducting state.

General properties of Superconductors:-

1. A superconductor is characterized by zero electrical resistivity.
2. Effect of temperature : When the temperature of a superconducting material is
increased the material transform into a normal material above the critical temperature
Tc when the material is cooled below Tc it again goes into superconducting state.
3. Effect of external magnetic field: The superconductivity vanishes if a sufficiently strong
magnetic field is applied. The minimum magnetic field is necessary to regain the normal
resistivity is called critical magnetic field H c . When the applied magnetic field exceeds
critical value Hc the superconducting state is destroyed and the material goes into the
normal state. Hc varies with temperatures.
T
Hc(T) = Hc(o)[1- ( ¿ 2]
TC
4. Critical current: A superconducting material carries a current, if the magnetic field due to
this current is equal Hc. The superconductivity is disappears.
Ic=2πrHc
5. Increasing the pressure on the material, the transition temperature can be increased.
6. Persistent Current : If a ring made of a superconductor is placed in a magnetic
field above its critical temperature, now cool the ring of superconductor
below its critical temperature and now if we remove the magnetic field a
current is induced in ring due to its self-inductance. By Lenz law the direction
of this induced current is such that it opposes the change in flux passing
through the ring. As the ring is in superconducting state (zero resistance), the
current induced in the ring will continue to flow this current is called the
persistent current. This persistent current produce a magnetic flux which
makes the magnetic flux passing through the ring constant.
7. Isotope Effect: The transition temperature are inversely proportional to the square root
of the atomic weights of the isotopes of a superconductor. Then
√ M T c=Constant.
Eg: Isotopes of Hg are from 199.5 to 203.4 atomic mass units. Therefore transition
temperatures are from 4.185K to 4.141K.
Meissner effect :-
Magnetic Levitation

A material which is placed in uniform

magnetic field at temperature greater
than transition temperature i.e. T >Tc as shown in the figure . When cooled below transition
temperature i.e. T<Tc , the magnetic flux is excluded from material and material goes into the
superconducting state. This is called Meissner effect. This shows that superconductor behaves
like a perfect diamagnetic
Types of Super conductors :-
 Type-I Superconductors
The superconductor in which sudden transition takes place from superconducting state
to normal state(fig.a). They exhibit complete Meissner effect .They are also called as soft
superconductors. Hc is low.
Example: Al, Zn, Ga.

 Types-II Superconductors
The superconductors in which
gradually transition from super
conducting to normal state takes
place for applied field below Hc 1
(lower critical field) , as shown in
fig.(b) the specimen behaves as
superconductor as the applied field
increases beyond Hc1 the lines of
flux start penetrating into the
specimen. Once applied field Hc 2(upper critical field) is reached all lines of flux will
penetrate into the specimen and the specimen goes into normal state. They are also
called as hard superconductors. They show incomplete Meissner effect between Hc 1
and Hc2.
Example: Zr, Nb, 60%Nb - 40%Ti alloy.

BCS Theory :-
An appropriate theory of superconductivity was proposed by J. Bardeen, L.H. Cooper and J.R.
Schreiffer in 1957 at University of Illinois (USA) and for which they were awarded the Nobel
Prize in Physics in 1972. Following this work, the theory has been called as BCS theory
The theory makes an important assumption that there exists an attractive force between the

Fig. 1 electrons in Fig.2 typical type-I

superconductors, which is due to Coulombic attraction between the electron and
the lattice. It is based on the understanding that due to negative charge an electron in the
lattice, there is a build of slight positive charges around it which in turn, attracts another
electron and these two electrons are known as a Cooper pair, as shown schematically in Fig.1.
The pair is stable only when the binding energy of this pair is energy to keep them together is
smaller than that from the thermal vibrations of the lattice which would attempt to break them
apart. That is why it is necessary that superconductivity is essentially a low temperature
phenomenon.
According to this theory superconductivity occurs due to the formation of electron pair these
two electrons having opposite spin and momenta form a pair through electron-electron
interaction via lattice deformation or phonon field. This electro pair is also called cooper
pair.This type of pair can occur only at very low temperature. One electron in this
communicating pair distorts the lattice the other electron takes up the energy and immediately
form a bound electron pair or cooper pair. The Fig.2 shows one electron with wave vector K
distorts the lattice emitting phonon(packet of lattice vibration) of wave vector q. The other
electron with wave vector K’ takes up the energy from lattice and its wave vector changes to
K’+q .These two electrons with opposite spin and wave vector K-q and K’+q form a cooper pair
and superconductivity occurs.

High Temperature Superconductors:-

Most first generation superconductors were elemental metals and metallic alloys. While most pure
elemental materials like tin, aluminum were called as type-I superconductors, metallic alloys like
niobium-nitride, niobium-titanium, and niobium-germanium alloys were classified as type-II
superconductors. However, most of these are superconducting at temperatures below 30 K.
In 1986, 75 years after the discovery of superconductivity, George Bednorz and Karl Müller at IBM,
Zurich demonstrated superconductivity in a perovskite structured lanthanum based cuprate oxide which
showed at TC of 35 K for which the inventors also won Physical Noble prize in 1987. This was a
remarkable discovery as it later allowed chemical substitution in perovskite cuprates to push the
transition temperatures well beyond the liquid nitrogen temperature (77 K) which is a much cheaper
and easily accessible medium as compared to liquid helium. This was realized by replacement of La by Y
to give rise to YBa2Cu3O7-x(YBCO) which showed a T C of ~92 K as first shown by Wu and his students at
University of Alabama, Huntsville in 1987.Subsequently many other oxides such as thallium and mercury
based oxide compounds showed even higher transition temperatures and these are usually called as
type-II superconductors. A list of important oxide superconductors is shown below with transition
temperatures

Compound Transition Temp.

YBa2Cu3O7 92K (-181 ̊C)
Bi2Sr2Ca2Cu3O6 110K (-163  ̊C)
Tl2Ba2Ca2Cu3O10 125K(-148  ̊C)
HgBa2Ca2Cu3O8 134K (-139  ̊C)

Applications of superconductors

1. Superconductors are use to make electromagnets for MRI/NMR machines

2. Superconductors are used to build Josephson junctions which are the building blocks
of SQUIDS, the most sensitive magnetometers.
3. Lower weight and volume of superconducting generators could lead to savings in
construction and lower costs, offsetting the higher costs for the generator.
4. Promising future applications include high-performance smart grid, electric power
transmission, transformers, power storage devices, electric motors (e.g. for vehicle
propulsion, as in vactrains or maglev trains), magnetic levitation devices, fault current
limiters, enhancing spintronic devices with superconducting materials, [50] and
superconducting magnetic refrigeration

JOSEPHSON JUNCTION :-

A thin insulating layer between two superconductors forms a

Josephson junction i.e.ACB as shown in the figure.As a
consequence of tunneling of electrons through the barrier
there is a net current across the junction this is called dc
Josephson effect the current flows in the absence of any
electric or magnetic field.On the other hand when dc voltage
applied across the junction causes oscillating tunneling current
across the junction this is called ac Joseph effect.The magnitude of current depends on the thickness of
the insulating layer,nature of materials and temperature.

SQUID : A SQUID (for superconducting quantum interference device) is a very

sensitive magnetometer used to measure extremely very weak magnetic fields of the order of 10-14
Tesla based on superconducting loops containing Josephson junctions. The
traditional superconducting materials for SQUIDs are pure niobium or a lead  with 10% gold
or indium.They are used to detect variation of very minute signals in terms of quantum flux,used as
storage device for magnetic flux,used in the study of earth quakes,also in the detection magnetic
signals from brain and heart.