Characteristics of strong ferromagnetic Josephson junctions with epitaxial barriers

TL;DR

This study investigates epitaxial superconductor/ferromagnetic Josephson junctions, revealing optimal barrier thickness for maximum critical current density and providing detailed interface and resistivity measurements.

Contribution

It reports the fabrication and characterization of epitaxial Nb/Fe20Ni80 Josephson junctions with specific interface resistance and resistivity data, highlighting non-monotonic behavior of critical current with barrier thickness.

Findings

Maximum critical current density of ~2.4 x 10^9 A/m^2 at 3 nm barrier

Non-monotonic dependence of I_C R_N on barrier thickness

Interface resistance and resistivity values consistent with polycrystalline samples

Abstract

We present the measurement of superconductor / ferromagnetic Josephson junctions, based on an epitaxial Nb bottom electrode and epitaxial Fe20Ni80 barrier. Uniform junctions have been fabricated with a barrier thicknesses in the range 2-12 nm. The maximum critical current density ~ 2.4 \pm 0.2 * 10^9 Am^-2 was found for a devices with a 3 nm thick barrier at 4.2 K, corresponding to an average characteristic voltage I_C R_N ~ 16 \muV. The I_C R_N showed a non-monotonic behavior with Fe20Ni80 thickness. The variation of the resistance of a unit area AR_N, of the junctions with barrier thickness gave a Nb/Py specific interface resistance of 6.0 \pm 0.5 f\Omega m^2 and Fe20Ni80 resistivity of 174 \pm 50 n\Omega m, consistent with other studies in polycrystalline samples.