Interactions between Josephson and pancake vortices revealed by second harmonic Hall measurements

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel second harmonic Hall measurement technique to study the interactions between Josephson and pancake vortices in anisotropic superconductors, providing new insights into vortex coupling and phase diagrams.

Contribution

It presents a new experimental method using second harmonic Hall measurements to probe vortex interactions in high-temperature superconductors.

Findings

Demonstrated the effectiveness of the measurement method

Revealed features of vortex coupling in Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8

Enabled potential determination of vortex phase diagrams

Abstract

The dynamic interactions between Josephson and pancake vortices in highly anisotropic superconductors are probed by shaking the former vortices with an ac magnetic field and measuring the second harmonic Hall response of the latter vortices with the sensor positioned above the sample. We demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed measurement method that aims to probe the coupling between the two vortex species. New experimental data obtained on Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8 single crystals reveal interesting features and the possibility to determine the phase diagram of vortex matter in such superconductors.