Suppression of superconductivity in epitaxial NbN ultrathin films

Journal Article · Tue Feb 01 00:00:00 EST 2011 · Journal of Applied Physics

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1063/1.3518037· OSTI ID:21538084

Kang, L; Jin, B B; Liu, X Y; Jia, X Q; Chen, J; Ji, Z M; Xu, W W; Wu, P H ^[1]; Mi, S B ^[2]; Pimenov, A ^[3]; Wu, Y J; Wang, B G ^[4]

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1. Research Institute of Superconductor Electronics (RISE), School of Electronic Science and Engineering, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093 (China)
2. Solid Atomic Imaging Division, Shenyang National Laboratory for Materials Science, Institute of Metal Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016 (China)
3. Experimentelle Physik IV, Universitaet Wuerzburg, Am Hubland, D-97074 Wuerzburg (Germany)
4. Department of Physics, National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093 (China)

This paper studies the suppression of superconducting transition temperature (T{sub c}) of ultrathin NbN film. We fabricated epitaxial NbN superconducting thin films of thicknesses ranging from 2.5 to 100 nm on single crystal MgO (100) substrates by dc magnetron sputtering. We performed structure analyses and measured their electric and far infrared properties. The experimental results were compared with several mechanisms of the suppression of superconductivity proposed in the literature, including the weak localization effect, the proximity effect, and quantum size effect (electron wave leakage model). We found that the electron wave leakage model matches best to the experimental data.

• OSTI ID: 21538084
• Journal Information: Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 109, Issue 3; Other Information: DOI: 10.1063/1.3518037; (c) 2011 American Institute of Physics; ISSN 0021-8979
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS
SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY
36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
DEPOSITION
EFFICIENCY
ELECTRONS
EPITAXY
LAYERS
LEAKS
MAGNESIUM OXIDES
MAGNETRONS
MONOCRYSTALS
NIOBIUM NITRIDES
PROXIMITY EFFECT
REGENERATION
SPUTTERING
SUBSTRATES
SUPERCONDUCTIVITY
THICKNESS
THIN FILMS
TRANSITION TEMPERATURE
TYPE-II SUPERCONDUCTORS
ALKALINE EARTH METAL COMPOUNDS
CHALCOGENIDES
CRYSTAL GROWTH METHODS
CRYSTALS
DIMENSIONS
ELECTRIC CONDUCTIVITY
ELECTRICAL PROPERTIES
ELECTRON TUBES
ELECTRONIC EQUIPMENT
ELEMENTARY PARTICLES
EQUIPMENT
FERMIONS
FILMS
LEPTONS
MAGNESIUM COMPOUNDS
MICROWAVE EQUIPMENT
MICROWAVE TUBES
NIOBIUM COMPOUNDS
NITRIDES
NITROGEN COMPOUNDS
OXIDES
OXYGEN COMPOUNDS
PHYSICAL PROPERTIES
PNICTIDES
REFRACTORY METAL COMPOUNDS
SUPERCONDUCTORS
THERMODYNAMIC PROPERTIES
TRANSITION ELEMENT COMPOUNDS