Effect of pressure on the physical properties of the superconductor NiBi3

TL;DR

This study investigates how applying pressure affects the superconducting properties of NiBi3, revealing a moderate decrease in critical temperature consistent with conventional electron-phonon interactions, supported by experimental and computational analysis.

Contribution

It combines resistivity, magnetization measurements, and DFT calculations to analyze pressure effects on NiBi3's superconductivity, providing new insights into its electron-phonon coupling behavior.

Findings

Critical temperature decreases from ~4.1K to ~3K under 2GPa pressure

Band structure changes under pressure support BCS-type superconductivity

Pressure induces a moderate suppression of superconductivity in NiBi3

Abstract

We present an experimental study of the superconducting properties of NiBi3 as a function of pressure by means of resistivity and magnetization measurements and combine our results with DFT calculations of the band structure under pressure. We find a moderate suppression of the critical temperature Tc from ~ 4.1K to ~ 3K by pressures up to 2GPa. By taking into account the change of the band structure as a function of pressure, we argue that the decrease in Tc is consistent with conventional, electron-phonon-mediated BCS-type superconductivity.