Abstract
IN 1931 de Haas and Voogd1 showed conclusively that the electrical resistance of a single crystal of very pure tin vanishes discontinuously at the transition temperature. In this experiment the external magnetic field was zero, and the transition curve was extrapolated to zero measuring current. They showed also that physical or chemical impurity produces an extended transition region. Since then it has been generally assumed2 that such an abrupt change of resistance also takes place when the transition occurs in a (longitudinal) magnetic field, extended transitions being ascribed to impurities. Experiments carried out in this Laboratory3,4 on very pure lead exhibiting transitions extending over a wide range of magnetic field cast doubt, however, on the validity of this assumption.
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References
de Haas, W. T., and Voogd, J., Comm. Leiden No. 214c (1931).
Shoenberg, D., "Superconductivity" (Camb. Univ. Press, 1938).
Pontius, R. B., Phil. Mag., 24, 787 (1937).
Daunt, J. G., Phil. Mag., 28, 24 (1939).
Mendelssohn, K., Proc. Roy. Soc., A, 152, 34 (1935).
de Haas, W. H., Leipziger Vortraege (1934).
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MACDONALD, D., MENDELSSOHN, K. The Superconductive Transition. Nature 162, 924 (1948). https://doi.org/10.1038/162924a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/162924a0
