title: Block copolymer self-assembly-directed synthesis of mesoporous gyroidal superconductors.
abstract: Superconductors with periodically ordered mesoporous structures are expected to have properties very different from those of their bulk counterparts. Systematic studies of such phenomena to date are sparse, however, because of a lack of versatile synthetic approaches to such materials. We demonstrate the formation of three-dimensionally continuous gyroidal mesoporous niobium nitride (NbN) superconductors from chiral ABC triblock terpolymer self-assembly-directed sol-gel-derived niobium oxide with subsequent thermal processing in air and ammonia gas. Superconducting materials exhibit a critical temperature (T c) of about 7 to 8 K, a flux exclusion of about 5% compared to a dense NbN solid, and an estimated critical current density (J c) of 440 A cm(-2) at 100 Oe and 2.5 K. We expect block copolymer self-assembly-directed mesoporous superconductors to provide interesting subjects for mesostructure-superconductivity correlation studies.
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.; Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Spencer W
authors.initials: SW
authors.lastname: Robbins
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Peter A
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-2147-0728
authors.initials: PA
authors.lastname: Beaucage
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Hiroaki
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-4268-2148
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Sai
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Kwan Wee
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-8289-6503
authors.initials: KW
authors.lastname: Tan
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.; Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Jörg G
authors.initials: JG
authors.lastname: Werner
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: James P
authors.initials: JP
authors.lastname: Sethna
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Francis J
authors.initials: FJ
authors.lastname: DiSalvo
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.; Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.; Kavli Institute at Cornell for Nanoscale Science, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Sol M
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Gruner
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Robert B
authors.initials: RB
authors.lastname: Van Dover
authors.affiliation: Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA.
authors.forename: Ulrich
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Wiesner
mesh_terms: D009556:Niobium / Q000737:chemistry; D011108:Polymers / Q000737:chemistry; D016062:Porosity; D000072176:Superconductivity
chemical_list: D011108:Polymers; D009556:Niobium