Influence of a perpendicular magnetic field on the thermal depinning of a single Abrikosov vortex in a superconducting Josephson junction

摘要

The prime interest of the present research is to measure the thermal energy needed for depinning a trapped vortex when an external magnetic field is perpendicular to the plane of the junction, and thus there are Meissner currents flowing along the edge of the film. These currents introduce an additional force and the author wishes to study thermal depinning under the influence of this force. These studies are of interest because Nb junctions are used in a wide range of electronic applications. Such junctions are useful, for instance, in superconducting quantum interference devices (SQUIDs) or in vortex-flow transistors because their performance can be enhanced by tuning the parameters of the individual junctions to optimum operation values. Also, gated Josephson junctions can be used as Josephson field-effect transistors (JOFETs).