Properties of recent IBAD-MOCVD Coated Conductors relevant to their high field, low temperature magnet use

TL;DR

This study compares BZO-containing and BZO-free IBAD-MOCVD coated conductors, showing BZO nanorods enhance pinning and Jc performance at 4.2 K without c-axis distortion, and introduces a new figure of merit for magnet design.

Contribution

It provides a detailed comparison of BZO nanorod effects on critical current anisotropy and introduces the OADI metric for improved magnet design considerations.

Findings

BZO nanorods do not distort Jc(theta) at 4.2 K

BZO enhances pinning and Jc performance at 4.2 K

BZO broadens the ab-plane Jc peak, improving high-field magnet use

Abstract

BaZrO3 (BZO) nanorods are now incorporated into production IBAD-MOCVD coated conductors. Here we compare several examples of both BZO-free and BZO-containing coated conductors using critical current (Ic) characterizations at 4.2 K over their full angular range up to fields of 31 T. We find that BZO nanorods do not produce any c-axis distortion of the critical current density Jc(theta) curve at 4.2 K at any field, but also that pinning is nevertheless strongly enhanced compared to the non-BZO conductors. We also find that the tendency of the ab-plane Jc(theta) peak to become cusp-like is moderated by BZO and we define a new figure of merit that may be helpful for magnet design - the OADI (Off-Axis Double Ic), which clearly shows that BZO broadens the ab-plane peak and thus raises Jc 5-30{\deg} away from the tape plane, where the most critical approach to Ic occurs in many coil designs. We describe some experimental procedures that may make critical current Ic tests of these very high current tapes more tractable at 4.2 K, where Ic exceeds 1000 A even for 4 mm wide tape with only 1 micron thickness of superconductor. A positive conclusion is that BZO is very beneficial for the Jc characteristics at 4.2 K, just as it is at higher temperatures, where the correlated c-axis pinning effects of the nanorods are much more obvious.