Resistive transition in frustrated Josephson-junction arrays on a honeycomb lattice

Abstract

We use driven Monte Carlo dynamics to study the resistive behavior of superconducting Josephson junction arrays on a honeycomb lattice in a magnetic field corresponding to $f$ flux quantum per plaquette. While for $f=1/3$ the onset of zero resistance is found at nonzero temperature, for $f=1/2$ the results are consistent with a transition scenario where the critical temperature vanishes and the linear resistivity shows thermally activated behavior. We determine the thermal critical exponent of the zero-temperature transition for $f=1/2$, from a dynamic scaling analysis of the nonlinear resistivity. The resistive behavior agrees with recent results obtained for the phase-coherence transition from correlation length calculations and with experimental observations on ultra-thin superconducting films with a triangular pattern of nanoholes.