The solution to the BCS gap equation and the second-order phase transition in superconductivity

Abstract

The existence and the uniqueness of the solution to the BCS gap equation of superconductivity is established in previous papers, but the temperature dependence of the solution is not discussed. In this paper, in order to show how the solution varies with the temperature, we first give another proof of the existence and the uniqueness of the solution and point out that the unique solution belongs to a certain set. Here this set depends on the temperature $T$. We define another certain subset of a Banach space consisting of continuous functions of both $T$ and $x$. Here, $x$ stands for the kinetic energy of an electron minus the chemical potential. Let the solution be approximated by an element of the subset of the Banach space above. We second show, under this approximation, that the transition to a superconducting state is a second-order phase transition.