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Reversible control of spin-polarized supercurrents in ferromagnetic Josephson junctions.


Type

Article

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Authors

Banerjee, N 
Robinson, JWA 
Blamire, MG 

Abstract

Magnetic inhomogeneity at a superconductor (S)-ferromagnet (F) interface converts spin-singlet Cooper pairs into spin-one triplet pairs. These pairs are immune to the pair-breaking exchange field in F and support a long-range proximity effect. Although recent experiments have confirmed the existence of spin-polarized triplet supercurrents in S-F-S Josephson junctions, reversible control of the supercurrent has been impossible because of the robust preconfigured nature of the inhomogeneity. Here, we use a barrier comprising three F layers whose relative magnetic orientation, and hence the interfacial inhomogeneity, can be controlled by small magnetic fields; we show that this enables full control of the triplet supercurrent and, by using finite element micromagnetic simulations, we can directly relate the experimental data to the theoretical models which provide a general framework to understand the role played by magnetic states in long-range supercurrent modulation.

Description

Keywords

cond-mat.supr-con, cond-mat.supr-con

Journal Title

Nat Commun

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

2041-1723
2041-1723

Volume Title

5

Publisher

Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Sponsorship
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EP/I038047/1)