A Bragg glass phase in the vortex lattice of a type II superconductor

Although crystals are usually quite stable, they are sensitive to a disordered environment: even an infinitesimal amount of impurities can lead to the destruction of crystalline order1. The resulting state of matter has been a long-standing puzzle. Until recently it was believed to be an amorphous state in which the crystal would break into ‘crystallites’2. But a different theory3 predicts the existence of a novel phase of matter: the so-called Bragg glass, which is a glass and yet nearly as ordered as a perfect crystal. The ‘lattice’ of vortices that contain magnetic flux in type II superconductors provide a good system to investigate these ideas4. Here we show that neutron-diffraction data of the vortex lattice provides unambiguous evidence for a weak, power-law decay of the crystalline order characteristic of a Bragg glass. The theory also predicts accurately the electrical transport properties of superconductors; it naturally explains the observed phase transitions4,5,6 and the dramatic jumps in the critical current7,8 associated with the melting of the Bragg glass. Moreover, the model explains experiments as diverse as X-ray scattering in disordered liquid crystals9,10 and the conductivity of electronic crystals11,12.