Nanostructured microsize YBCO mesas for applications as field sensors

Flux Dynamics in High-Temperature Superconductors With Microscale Irradiation-Modified Regions

“…Transmission Electron Microscopy measurements revealed that the Au ion impacts on YBCO film create insulating columnar nanostructures with a diameter of about 5 nm surrounded by a larger amorphous zone [10]. The ion beam was collimated through a microsize pinhole (70 ) on the (X-Y) moving target (see [3], [4] and references therein).…”

“…The sub-micrometric spatial resolution (around 0. 4 ) is practically lim- ited by the used light wavelength. Such resolution is adequate and then necessary to study the local electromagnetic properties, i.e., to detect any kind of inhomogeneity, both chemical and electromagnetic, and to distinguish between local and nonlocal interactions among the microscopic current loops taking place in inhomogeneous HTSC's [2].…”

“…C ONFINED irradiation [1]- [4] by means of monochromatic particle beams with much higher flux than the one reached in typical radiation-hard environments, can modify the electromagnetic properties of highsuperconductors (HTSCs) on the micron-scale. Such micron-scale modulated HTSCs exhibit contiguous regions whose electric state reacts to external perturbations (e.g., steady-state magnetic fields and photons) in a discontinuous way over the same period of the micron-scale structural modulation [2], [5].…”

“…The spatial distance of these columnar nanostructures is characterized by a very peaked distribution that is finely controlled through the ion beam fluence. Thus, an high-energy heavy-ion (HEHI) lithography [1] is obtained by means of a dedicated beam facility suitably engineered for the micron-scale confinement of the beam and its movement, with nanometric resolution, over the sample surface, i.e., the (X-Y) plane [3], [4].…”

THz Detection Above 77 K in YBCO Films Patterned by Heavy-Ion Lithography

“…Recently, YBCO strip-shaped films patterned by HEHI were indeed exploited for developing low-power magnetic field detectors [11]. In that case, the voltage detected across the strip, as induced by an external magnetic field, is only due to the electrical power dissipation occurring in the irradiated region [12], [13]. This functional electromagnetic decoupling was also exploited in a dynamic 1530-437X/$26.00 © 2010 IEEE fashion, i.e., when the temperature of the HTSC film is low enough, with a certain bias current, to keep in a dissipation-less state both the irradiated and the as-grown regions, while an external photon excitation, in the Visible (VIS) spectrum, leads only the irradiated region in the dissipative state [14].…”