Phase diagrams of flux lattices with disorder

TL;DR

This paper reviews the phase diagram of flux lattices in disordered type II superconductors, highlighting a transition from a Bragg glass to a vortex glass or liquid, supported by experimental data.

Contribution

It revisits and supports the predicted phase diagram with estimates of phase boundaries using a Lindemann criterion, aligning theory with experiments.

Findings

Identification of a Bragg glass phase at low fields

Transition to vortex glass or liquid at higher fields

Compatibility of phenomenology with recent experiments

Abstract

We review the prediction, made in a previous work [Phys. Rev. B 52 (1995)], that the phase diagram of type II superconductors consists of a topologically ordered Bragg glass phase at low fields undergoing a transition at higher fields into a vortex glass or a liquid. We estimate the position of the phase boundary using a Lindemann criterion. We find that the proposed phenomenology is compatible with recent experiments on superconductors.