Compact vortex structures' dynamics in HTS bulks with levitation techniques

Abstract

The discovery of high temperature superconductors (HTS) has led to understanding that, in order to explain and utilize the phenomenon, completely new physical approaches should be introduced at all scales: microscopic, mesoscopic, macroscopic. Leaving first two scales beyond the scope of the present paper we focus in the upper limit of the last one, the study of the magnetic flux dynamics in HTS bulks - the dynamics of the 'compact vortex structures'. A new direction in the experimental superconducting physics, the investigation of HTS bulks with levitation techniques, which has been elaborated during last years to effectively explore the subject, as well as the new fundamental and applied results obtained therefrom are overviewed here.