Size effects of nano-scale pinning centers on the superconducting properties of YBCO single grains

Abstract

High pinning superconductors are the most promising materials for power engineering. Their superconducting properties are governed by the microstructure quality and the vortex pinning behavior. We report on a study of the vortex pinning in YBa2Cu3O7−x (YBCO) single grain with defects induced through the addition of insulating nano-particles. In order to improve the critical current density, YBCO textured bulk superconductors were elaborated using the Top Seeded Melt Texture and Growth process with different addition amounts of Al2O3 nano-particles. Serving as strong pinning centers, 0.05% excess of Al2O3 causes a significant enhancement of the critical current density Jc under self field and in magnetic fields at 77K. The enhanced flux pinning achieved with the low level of alumina nano-particles endorses the effectiveness of insulating nano-inclusions to induce effectives pinning sites within the superconducting matrix. On the other side, we focused on the effect of the size of pinning centers on the critical current density. This work was carried out using two batches of alumina nano-particles characterized by two different particle size distributions with mean diameters PSD1=20nm and PSD2=2.27μm. The matching effects of the observed pinning force density have been compared. The obtained results have shown that the flux pinning is closely dependent on the size of the artificial pinning centers. Our results suggest that the optimization of the size of the artificial pinning centers is crucial to a much better understanding of the pinning mechanisms and therefore to insure high superconducting performance for the practical application of superconducting materials.