Enhanced critical currents of superconducting ErNi2B2C in the ferromagnetically ordered state

Phys Rev Lett. 2000 Mar 13;84(11):2497-500. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.84.2497.

Abstract

We report on transport and magnetization studies of the critical current in single crystal ErNi2B2C for applied fields below 4 kG. Below T approximately 2.5 K superconductivity coexists with weak ferromagnetism. We find that the critical currents are strongly enhanced for all field orientations in this ferromagnetic regime, corresponding to a threefold increase of the pinning force of the flux line lattice. We speculate that this increase is due to strong pair breaking by the ferromagnetism.