PREPARATION OF MELT-TEXTURED NDBA2CU3OY BULK WITH ND4BA2CU2O10 ADDITION

The NdBa2Cu3Oy (Nd123) bulk superconductor, to which Nd4Ba2Cu2O10 (Nd4 22) particles were intentionally added, was prepared through the so-ca lled MMTG process in Ar (99% purity) flowing atmosphere at an ambient pressure. The quasi-single crystal thus grown was about 1 cm X 1 cm X 1 cm in dimension. It turned out that the Nd422 particles were uniform ly distributed in the Nd123-phase matrix in a fashion similar to the d istribution of the intentionally added Y211 particles in the Y123 phas e matrix. The superconducting transition temperature T-c for the sampl e subjected to post-annealing in oxygen atmosphere was 94 K. The criti cal current density J(c) was determined to be 45 000 A/cm(2) at 77 K a nd 1 T, when the field was applied parallel to the c-axis of the sampl e. To the best of our knowledge, the J(c) value is the highest and the size of the quasi-single crystal is the largest in the melt-textured Nd123 bulk superconductors so far reported.