Method to determine critical current of poorly cooled short sample

Abstract

Superconducting wire characterization can fail owing to many reasons. For example, unintentional sample heating may distort voltage–current-data, i.e. decrease the critical current and increase the n-value. This occurs rarely if a sample is immersed into liquid cryogen, but in conduction cooled measurements, constant sample temperature is difficult to achieve. Ohmic losses are generated at current contacts as well as inside the sample even at subcritical currents. Most of these losses can be extracted using a well designed sample holder, but in any case, significant amount of heat is generated rapidly when critical current is approached and overstepped, especially if n-value is low. Then, heat has no time to conduct away, and thus, the sample will warm up distorting the measurement. In this paper, we present a computational post-processing method to reduce the effect of heating on measured voltage–current characteristics. Simulations are performed for a Bi-2223/Ag tape, but the model can be applied to any other superconductor as well.