Muon-spin rotation spectra in the mixed phase of high-T_c superconductors: thermal fluctuations and disorder effects

Abstract

We study muon-spin rotation (μSR) spectra in the mixed phase of highly anisotropic layered superconductors, specifically Bi_2+xSr_2-xCaCu₂O_8+δ (BSCCO), by modeling the fluid and solid phases of pancake vortices using liquid-state and density functional methods. The role of thermal fluctuations in causing motional narrowing of μSR line shapes is quantified in terms of a first-principles theory of the flux-lattice melting transition. The effects of random point pinning are investigated using a replica treatment of liquid-state correlations and a replicated density functional theory. Our results indicate that motional narrowing in the pure system, although substantial, cannot account for the remarkably small linewidths obtained experimentally at relatively high fields and low temperatures. We find that satisfactory agreement with the μSR data for BSCCO in this regime can be obtained through the ansatz that this "phase" is characterized by frozen short-range positional correlations reflecting the structure of the liquid just above the melting transition. This proposal is consistent with recent suggestions of a "pinned liquid" or "glassy" state of pancake vortices in the presence of pinning disorder. Our results for the high-temperature liquid phase indicate that measurable linewidths may be obtained in this phase as a consequence of density inhomogeneities induced by the pinning disorder. The results presented here comprise a unified, first-principles theoretical treatment of μSR spectra in highly anisotropic layered superconductors in terms of a controlled set of approximations.