Enhanced critical magnetization currents due to fast neutron irradiation in single-crystal YBa2Cu3O7- delta.

Abstract

Magnetization measurements were performed on single crystals of $\mathrm{Y}{\mathrm{Ba}}_{2}{\mathrm{Cu}}_{3}{\mathrm{O}}_{7\ensuremath{-}\ensuremath{\delta}}$ to study the effect of fast neutron irradiation on flux pinning and the critical magnetization current. Neutron irradiation up to a fluence of 8.16\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}${10}^{17}$ n/${\mathrm{cm}}^{2}$ systematically enhanced the magnitude and reduced the anisotropy of the critical magnetization current compared to unirradiated samples. The largest increases in the critical magnetization current occurred at 77 K. There was a slight linear decrease in the transition temperature with neutron fluence.