The investigation of the lattice strains and crystallite sizes of Y358 and Y123 high-temperature superconductors

In this study, the Y358 phase, the newest high-temperature superconductor member of the yttrium barium copper oxide family, was produced using the solid-state reaction technique. The Y358 superconductor exhibited the Meissner effect at low temperature (77 K). The X-ray diffraction spectra indicated that the crystal structure was almost identical to that of Y123, but with some impurity peaks. An X-ray peak broadening analysis was applied to determine the lattice strain, and the medial crystallite size was calculated perpendicular to the surface of the superconductor specimens. As a result of the analyses, it was determined that the crystallite size of the Y358 superconductor was about 1.125 times larger than that of the Y123 superconductor.