The Magnetic and Structural Properties of SiC-Doped MgB2 Bulks Prepared by the Standard Ceramic Processing

Abstract

According to general formula MgB2−xSiCx (x = 0, 0.05, 0.1, 0.2), MgB2 and SiC-doped bulk superconduc- tors were prepared by the standard ceramic processing. The mixtures of the corresponding powders were sintered at 750 °C for 0.5 h under pressure of 8 bar Argon. X-ray dif- fraction patterns show that all the samples have MgB2 as the main phase with a very small amount of MgO; further, with SiC-doped, the presence of Mg2Si is also noted. The magnetization-temperature measurements showed a transi- tion temperature of 37.5 K for the undoped sample which indicates the typical transition temperature of MgB2. When the content of SiC increased in the sample, the transition temperatures decreased to the lower temperatures system- atically. The M-H loops measured using a VSM showed very large magnetization value at low temperature for SiC doped samples. The largest M-H loops were taken from the sample contains 5% SiC. The critical current density of samples calculated from M-H loops indicated a value of around 4 × 10 5 A/cm 2 , which is in good agreement with the literature.