Iron-Arsenic Superconductors In Class Of Their Own

Via ScienceDaily.com -

Physicists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory have experimentally demonstrated that the superconductivity mechanism in the recently-discovered iron-arsenide superconductors is unique compared to all other known classes of superconductors. These findings – combined with iron-arsenide's potential good ability to carry current due to their low anisotropy – may open a door to exciting possible applications in zero-resistance power transmission.

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The team's results were published in recent issues of Physical Review Letters and Physical Review B: Rapid Communications.

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The iron-arsenide superconductors' unique power-law variation of London penetration depth was observed across several FeAs-based systems. The Ames Lab group studied large single crystals of barium-iron-arsenic in which cobalt was substituted for part of the iron, grown and characterized at Ames Lab by senior physicist Paul Canfield's research group. They also studied neodymium-iron-arsenic-oxide and lanthanum-iron-arsenic-oxide samples grown and characterized by Canfield's group.

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In addition, the group found unambiguous evidence that the iron-arsenide superconductors' full data set can only be explained with two distinct superconducting gaps. Thus, the iron-arsenic superconductors appear to exhibit properties of both high-temperatures cuprates and magnesium diboride.