Resistivity of Inhomogeneous Superconducting Wires

Understand

We study the contribution of quantum phase fluctuations in the superconducting order parameter to the low--temperature resistivity $\rho(T)$ of a dirty and inhomogeneous superconducting wire.

• In particular, we account for random spatial fluctuations of arbitrary size in the wire thickness.
• For a typical wire thickness above the critical value for superconductor--insulator transition, phase--slips processes can be treated perturbatively.
• We use a memory formalism approach, which underlines the role played by weak violation of conservation laws in the mechanism for generating finite resistivity.