Magnetic field tunable vortex diode made of YBa2Cu3O7?? Josephson junction asymmetrical arrays

Chesca, Boris; John, Daniel; Pollett, Richard; Gaifullin, Marat; Cox, Jonathan; Mellor, Christopher; Savelev, Sergey

Abstract

Several Josephson ratchets designed as asymmetrically structured parallel-series arrays of Josephson junctions made of YBa2Cu3O7−δ have been fabricated. From the current-voltage characteristics measured for various values of applied magnetic field, B, in the temperature range of 10–89 K, we demonstrate that the devices work as magnetic field-tunable highly reversible vortex diodes. Thus, at 89 K, the ratchet efficiency η could be reversed from +60% to −60% with a change in B as small as 3 μT. By decreasing the operation temperature, η improves up to −95% at 10 K while the dynamics in the B-tunability degrades. The ratchet designs we propose here can be used to control unidirectional vortex flow vortices in superconducting devices as well as building integrated nano-magnetic sensors. Numerical simulations qualitatively confirm our experimental findings and also provide insight into the related and more general problem of the control of the transport of nano/quantum objects in thin films.

Citation

Chesca, B., John, D., Pollett, R., Gaifullin, M., Cox, J., Mellor, C., & Savelev, S. (in press). Magnetic field tunable vortex diode made of YBa2Cu3O7?? Josephson junction asymmetrical arrays. Applied Physics Letters, 111(6), https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4997741

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jul 26, 2017
• Online Publication Date: Aug 8, 2017
• Deposit Date: Sep 7, 2017
• Publicly Available Date: Sep 7, 2017
• Journal: Applied Physics Letters
• Print ISSN: 0003-6951
• Electronic ISSN: 0003-6951
• Publisher: American Institute of Physics
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 111
• Issue: 6
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4997741
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/876732
• Publisher URL: http://aip.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/1.4997741