Coated conductors containing grains with big aspect ratios

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that increasing grain aspect ratios in coated conductors significantly enhances their critical current capacity by reducing grain boundary effects, offering a practical approach for developing competitive high-Tc superconducting cables.

Contribution

It introduces a method to improve high-Tc superconductor performance by using grains with large aspect ratios to minimize grain boundary impacts.

Findings

Critical currents are significantly increased with larger grain aspect ratios.

Reducing grain boundary effects improves superconductor performance.

A practical pathway for high-Tc cable development is proposed.

Abstract

It is shown that the critical currents of high-Tc superconducting tapes fabricated by the coated conductor technologies are enhanced considerably if grain arrangements with large effective grain boundary areas are used. Increasing the aspect ratios of the grains reduces the deleterious effects of the grain boundaries. A practical road to competitive high-Tc cables is proposed.