Quasiparticle scattering induced by charge doping of iron-pnictide superconductors probed by collective vortex pinning

Phys Rev Lett. 2010 Dec 31;105(26):267002. doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.105.267002. Epub 2010 Dec 22.

Abstract

Charge doping of iron-pnictide superconductors leads to collective pinning of flux vortices, whereas isovalent doping does not. Moreover, flux pinning in the charge-doped compounds is consistently described by the mean-free path fluctuations introduced by the dopant atoms, allowing for the extraction of the elastic quasiparticle scattering rate. The absence of scattering by dopant atoms in isovalently doped BaFe2(As(1-x)P(x))(2) is consistent with the observation of a linear temperature dependence of the low-temperature penetration depth in this material.