Enhanced critical currents of superconducting ErNi2B2C in the ferromagnetically ordered state
13 March 2000
We report on transport and magnetization studies of the critical current in single crystal ErNi2B2C for applied fields below 4 kG. Below T approximate to 2.5 K superconductivity coexists with weak ferromagnetism. We fmd that the critical currents are strongly enhanced for all field orientations in this ferromagnetic regime, corresponding to a threefold increase of the pinning force of the flux line lattice. We speculate that this increase is due to strong pair breaking by the ferromagnetism.