Photoconductivity effects in mixed-phase BSCCO whiskers

We report on combined photoconductivity and annealing experiments in whisker-like crystals of the Bi–Sr–Ca–Cu–O (BSCCO) high-Tc superconductor. Both single-phase Bi2 Sr2 CaCu2 O8+δ (Bi-2212) samples and crystals of the mixed phases Bi2 Sr2 Ca2 Cu3 O10+x (Bi-2223)/Bi-2212 have been subjected to annealing treatments at 90°C in air in a few hours steps, up to a maximum total annealing time of 47 h. At every step, samples have been characterized by means of electrical resistance versus temperature (R versus T) and resistance versus time at fixed temperature (R versus t) measurements, both in the dark and under illumination with a UV–Vis halogen arc lamp. A careful comparison of the results from the two techniques has shown that, while for single-phase samples no effect is recorded, for mixed-phase samples an enhancement in the conductivity that increases with increasing annealing time is induced by the light at the nominal temperature T = 100 K, i.e. at an intermediate temperature between the critical temperatures of the two phases. A simple pseudo-1D model based on the Kudinov’s scheme (Kudinov et al, 1993 Phys. Rev. B 47 9017–28) has been developed to account for the observed effects, which is based on the existence of Bi-2223 filaments embedded in the Bi-2212 matrix and on the presence of electronically active defects at their interfaces. This model reproduces fairly well the photoconductive experimental results and shows that the length of the Bi-2223 filaments decreases and the number of defects increases with increasing annealing time.