Synergistic strategies for enhancing flux pinning in YBa2Cu3O7-x thin films at high fields and low temperature

An unexplored approach for the improvement of the flux pinning of YBa 2 Cu 3 O 7-x (YBCO) superconducting films grown by pulsed laser deposition (PLD) on SrTiO 3 single-crystals is presented. Hence, substrate-decorated ZrO 2 nanoislands combined with Ba 2 Y(Nb/Ta)O 6 nanocolumns were engineered into YBCO films. The nanoislands produced a high density of pinning centres. In this synergistic combined pinning scenario, an absence of a temperature scaling pinning force, F p ( H ) behaviour was observed, confirming several pinning mechanisms are active in the system. Thus, the high density of stacking faults and BYTO nanocolumns were both shown to be effective for high field pinning at <50K. Further optimisation of the densities and volumes of each pinning type is expected to produce enhanced high field (>9 T) pinning behaviour.