Glass transitions in monodisperse cluster-forming ensembles: vortex matter in type-1.5 superconductors

TL;DR

This paper investigates the glass transition in vortex matter within type-1.5 superconductors, revealing how multi-scale interactions induce effective polydispersity and hinder ordering, leading to vortex glass formation.

Contribution

It demonstrates the formation of vortex glass in monodisperse, clean, type-1.5 superconducting systems due to multi-scale interactions causing effective polydispersity.

Findings

Suppression of particle hopping hinders ordering at low temperatures.

Effective polydispersity explains the glass transition.

Vortex glass can form in clean, monodisperse systems.

Abstract

At low enough temperatures and high densities, the equilibrium configuration of an ensemble of ultrasoft particles is a self-assembled, ordered, cluster-crystal. In the present work we explore the out-of-equilibrium dynamics for a two-dimensional realization, which is relevant to superconducting materials with multi-scale intervortex forces. We find that for small temperatures following a quench, the suppression of the thermally-activated particle hopping hinders the ordering. This results in a glass transition for a monodispersed ensemble, for which we derive a microscopic explanation in terms of an "effective polydispersity" induced by multi-scale interactions. This demonstrates that a vortex glass can form in clean systems of thin films of "type-1.5" superconductors. An additional setup to study this physics can be layered superconducting systems, where the shape of the effective vortex-vortex interactions can be engineered.