Influence of a Novel Heat Treatment on Structures and Superconducting Properties of YGdBCO Coated Conductors

Abstract

Preliminary results for a future superconducting joint between YGdBCO coated conductors (CCs) were reported in this work. A promising heat treatment called as melting diffusion and texture merging to connect CCs was proposed and the influence of different treatment on the texture, the surface morphologies and the superconducting properties of YGdBCO CCs were investigated. The impurity phase such as (YGd)211 and BaCuO generated in partial melting stage can be transformed into textured (YGd)123 via low-temperature recrystallization, which is helpful to form textured interface between two CCs. With a comparison to the partial melting process, the superconducting properties of YGdBCO CCs with recrystallization after partial melting can be recovered in a shorter time of 75 h under flowing O₂ gas. It demonstrates that this heat treatment is prospective to fabricate a superconducting joint for REBCO CCs. This joint work is undergoing in our group.