Eur. Phys. J. B 31, 103-109 (2003)
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2003-00014-x

Electron transport in a mesoscopic superconducting / ferromagnetic hybrid conductor

¹ Centre de Recherches sur les Très Basses Températures - CNRS (associated to Université Joseph Fourier) , 25 avenue des Martyrs, 38042 Grenoble, France
² Laboratoire de Photonique et de Nanostructures, Route de Nozay, 91460 Marcoussis, France

Corresponding author: ^a herve.courtois@grenoble.cnrs.fr

Received: 9 July 2002
Revised: 22 October 2002
Published online: 27 January 2003

Abstract

We present electrical transport experiments performed on submicron hybrid devices made of a ferromagnetic conductor (Co) and a superconducting (Al) electrode. The sample was patterned in order to separate the contributions of the Co conductor and of the Co-Al interface. We observed a strong influence of the Al electrode superconductivity on the resistance of the Co conductor. This effect is large only when the interface is highly transparent. We characterized the dependence of the observed resistance decrease on temperature, bias current and magnetic field. As the differential resistance of the ferromagnet exhibits a non-trivial asymmetry, we claim that the magnetic domain structure plays an important role in the electron transport properties of superconducting / ferromagnetic conductors.