Cuprate/manganite heterostructures

Advances in thin film deposition techniques have made it possible to produc e heterostructures of high-temperature superconducting compounds and mangan ite perovskites. The latter exhibit the phenomenon of colossal magnetoresis tance (CMR). The half-metallic character of the CMR compounds results in th eir carriers being spin polarized. Experiments with these heterostructures have demonstrated that the injection of spin-polarized carriers into high-t emperature superconductors results in a reduction of parameters such as the critical current and critical temperature. The experimental situation is r eviewed, and open questions are identified. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.