Broad Temperature Pinning Study of 15 mol.% Zr-Added (Gd, Y)-Ba-Cu-O MOCVD Coated Conductors

• Published in: IEEE transactions on applied superconductivity 2015-06, Vol.25 (3), p.1-5
• Main Authors: Xu, Aixia, Hu, Xinbo, Jaroszynski, Jan, Larbalestier, David, Khatri, Narayan, Liu, Yuhao, Majkic, Goran, Galstyan, Eduard, Selvamanickam, Venkat, Chen, Yimin, Lei, Changhui, Abraimov, Dmytro
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Anisotropic magnetoresistance; BaZrO3 nanorods; Conductors; critical current density; flux pinning; Integrated circuits; Magnetic fields; MOCVD; REBCO coated conductor
• ISSN: 1051-8223; 1558-2515
• DOI: 10.1109/TASC.2014.2375231

BaZrO 3 (BZO) nanocolumns have long been shown to be very effective for raising the pinning force Fp of REBa 2 Cu 3 O x (REBCO, where RE = rare earth) films at high temperatures and recently at low temperatures too. We have successfully incorporated a high density of BZO nanorods into metal organic chemical vapor deposited (MOCVD) REBCO coated conductors via Zr addition. We found that, compared to the 7.5% Zr-added coated conductor, dense BZO nanorod arrays in the 15% Zr-added conductor are effective over the whole temperature range from 77 K down to 4.2 K. We attribute the substantially enhanced J c at 30 K to the weak uncorrelated pinning as well as the strong correlated pinning. Meanwhile, by tripling the REBCO layer thickness to ~2.8 μm, the engineering critical current density J c at 30 K exceeds J c of optimized Nb-Ti wires at 4.2 K.