Superconductivity

P.H. Kes, J. Aarts, V.M. Vinokur, C.J. van der Beek, "Dissipation in highly anisotropic superconductors," Physical Review Letters, 64: 1063-66, 1990.

P.H. Kes (Kamerlingh Onnes Laboratory, Leiden University, The Netherlands): "In this article we wanted three things: to offer an explanation for the puzzling dependence of the electric dissipation in highly textured Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8 films on the field orientation; to stress the special features of flux lines in extremely anisotropic layered superconductors; and to point out the consequences for the applicability of the bismuth- and thallium-based high-temperature superconductors. The main issue is that superconductivity in these materials is concentrated in the CuO2 layers, which are only weakly coupled via Josephson tunneling. Consequently, a flux line breaks up into two-dimensional `pancake' vortices in the layers for all but the parallel field orientation. In almost all practical situations the vortex lattice may therefore be considered as if it is created by the perpendicular...