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Interplay between superconductivity and ferromagnetism in crystalline nanowires

Nature Physics volume 6, pages 389–394 (2010)Cite this article

Abstract

The interaction between superconductivity and ferromagnetism, which entails incompatible spin order, is one of the problems of fundamental interest in condensed-matter physics. In general, when a ferromagnet is placed in contact with a superconductor, the Cooper pairs from the superconductor are not expected to survive beyond at most a few nanometres into the ferromagnet. Here we present a systematic study of single-crystal ferromagnetic cobalt nanowires sandwiched between superconducting electrodes. Surprisingly, we find that a cobalt wire as long as 600 nm attains zero resistance at low temperatures. For even longer nanowires, the transition to incomplete superconductivity is foreshadowed by a strikingly large and sharp resistance peak near the superconducting transition temperature of the electrodes. Although the origin of the ‘critical peak’ remains mysterious, our analysis strongly points against charge or spin imbalance as its underlying cause.

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Figure 1: TEM characterization and transport measurement of a 40 nm Co nanowire, with L=0.6 μm.
Figure 2: R–T behaviour of 1.5-μm-long Co nanowires contacted by superconducting electrodes.
Figure 3: R–H property and AMR effect of the 80 nm Co nanowire.
Figure 4: Measurements using a combination of superconducting and non-superconducting electrodes.
Figure 5: Transport behaviour of a 60 nm Ni nanowire.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Penn State MRSEC under NSF grant DMR-0820404 and the Pennsylvania State University Materials Research Institute Nano Fabrication Network and the National Science Foundation Cooperative Agreement No. 0335765, National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network, with Cornell University. We are grateful to P. A. Lee for helpful discussions. We thank J. Cardellino and D. Rench for magnetic force microscopy measurements.

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Author notes

  1. Nitesh Kumar & Chuntai Shi

    Present address: Present addresses: Intel Corporation, 2501 NW 229th Avenue, Hillsboro, Oregon 97124, USA (N.K.); Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California, Riverside, California 92521, USA (C.S.),

Authors and Affiliations

  1. The Center for Nanoscale Science, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802-6300, USA

    Jian Wang, Meenakshi Singh, Mingliang Tian, Nitesh Kumar, Chuntai Shi, J. K. Jain, Nitin Samarth, T. E. Mallouk & M. H. W. Chan

  2. Department of Physics, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802-6300, USA

    Jian Wang, Meenakshi Singh, Mingliang Tian, Nitesh Kumar, Chuntai Shi, J. K. Jain, Nitin Samarth, T. E. Mallouk & M. H. W. Chan

  3. Materials Research Institute, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802-6300, USA

    Bangzhi Liu

  4. Department of Chemistry, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsylvania 16802-6300, USA

    T. E. Mallouk

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Contributions

J.W., M.H.W.C. and M.T. planned the experiments. J.W., M.S., N.K. and B.L. carried out the experiments. J.W., M.H.W.C., C.S., J.K.J., N.S., M.T. and T.E.M. analysed the data.

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Correspondence to Jian Wang or M. H. W. Chan.

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Wang, J., Singh, M., Tian, M. et al. Interplay between superconductivity and ferromagnetism in crystalline nanowires. Nature Phys 6, 389–394 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys1621

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