Phys. Rev. B 80, 180501(R) (2009) [4 pages]Spontaneous fluxoid formation in superconducting loops
See accompanying Physics Viewpoint We report on the experimental verification of the Zurek-Kibble scenario in an isolated superconducting ring over a wide parameter range. The probability of creating a single flux quantum spontaneously during the fast normal-superconducting phase transition of a wide Nb loop clearly follows a scaling relation on the quenching time τQ, as one would expect if the transition took place as fast as causality permits. However, the observed Zurek-Kibble scaling exponent σ=0.62±0.15 is two times larger than anticipated for large loops. Assuming Gaussian winding number densities we show that this doubling is well founded for small annuli. © 2009 The American Physical Society URL:
http://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevB.80.180501
DOI:
10.1103/PhysRevB.80.180501
PACS:
74.50.+r, 67.25.dk, 05.70.Fh, 11.27.+d
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