Relaxation and glassy dynamics in disordered type-II superconductors

Abstract

We study the non-equilibrium relaxation kinetics of interacting magnetic flux lines in disordered type-II superconductors at low temperatures and low magnetic fields by means of a three-dimensional elastic line model and Monte Carlo simulations. Investigating the vortex density and height autocorrelation functions as well as the flux line mean-square displacement, we observe the emergence of glassy dynamics, caused by the competing effects of vortex pinning due to point defects and long-range repulsive interactions between the flux lines. Our systematic numerical study allows us to carefully disentangle the associated different relaxation mechanisms, and to assess their relative impact on the kinetics of dilute vortex matter at low temperatures.