Abstract
Single crystals of grown using a self-flux solution method were characterized via x-ray, transport, and magnetization studies, revealing a superconducting phase below characterized by a full electrical resistivity transition and partial diamagnetic screening. The reversible destruction and reinstatement of this phase by heat treatment and mechanical deformation studies, along with single-crystal x-ray diffraction measurements, indicate that internal crystallographic strain originating from -axis-oriented planar defects plays a central role in promoting the appearance of superconductivity under ambient-pressure conditions in of as-grown crystals. The appearance of a ferromagnetic moment with magnitude proportional to the tunable superconducting volume fraction suggests that these phenomena are both stabilized by lattice distortion.
- Received 26 November 2008
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.103.037005
©2009 American Physical Society