Weak superconductivity

This Proceedings consist of invited papers and contributions presented at the Fifth Czechoslovak Symposium on Weak Superconductivity (5CSSWS) held at Smolenice Castle from May 29 to June 2, 1989. This five-days meeting was organized by the Institute of Electrical Engineering, Electro-Physical Research Center, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, in cooperation with the Institute of Measurement and Measuring Techniques, EPRC, SAS, Bratislava and the Institute of Physics, CSAS, in Prague. From the beginning the Czechoslovak activities in weak superconductivity were concerned with preparation and study of properties of weak links based on superconducting thin films of Pb, Nb, and Nb3Sn, as well as bulk point contacts and rf SQUIDs for magnetometry. The possibility of application of superconducting weak links with tunnel and bridge junctions in measuring techniques, magnetometry, medicine, metrology, radiometry, etc., were studied. Some of these activities are still in progress. These Proceedings include contributions on the properties of tunnel junctions, electrodynamics of SQUIDs, computer simulation of interferometers, multi-channel magnetometry for biomagnetic applications, etc. The discovery of high Tc superconductivity influenced strongly the topics of 5CSSWS. Most contributions of this volume are devoted to the preparation of high Tc superconductor thin films by vacuum deposition techniques because of their dominant role in technology of cryoelectronic microcircuits. Further, results in the study of physical properties of high Tc superconducting thin films by means of both dc and rf methods, tunnel and microcontact spectroscopy, are documented. Other contributions deal with preparation of rf SQUIDs, radiation detectors, etc