Vortex Line Ordering in the Driven Three-Dimensional Vortex Glass

Abstract

Resistively-shunted-junction dynamics is applied to the three dimensional uniformly frustrated XY model with randomly perturbed couplings, as a model for driven steady states in a type-II superconductor with quenched point pinning. For a disorder strength p strong enough to produce a vortex glass in equilibrium, we map the phase diagram as a function of temperature T and uniform driving current I. We find that, within a finite current range I_{c1}(T)<I<I_{c2}(T), the system orders into a set of periodically spaced smectic planes of vortex lines. Smectic planes are short range correlated with neighboring planes; vortex lines within a given plane are periodic along the direction of motion, while disordered along the direction of the applied magnetic field.