Final Activity Report Summary - EYA (Optical properties of MgB2-based superconductors)
The most prominent feature of our results concerning the Mg1-xAlxB2-yCy compounds is that the co-addition of Al (up to 0.02) and C (up to 0.08) retains the two-band superconductivity in the presence of significant scattering. Complementary Raman measurements show significant evidence of electron-phonon coupling attenuation in these compounds. Furthermore, inelastic neutron scattering measurements on Mg11B2-xCx samples shows that the high energy part of the generalised phonon density-of-states is hardly affected upon boron doping and that the temperature dependence of the phonon spectrum for the MgB1.96C0.04 compound clarifies the importance of certain modes in the superconducting process.
Finally, we have extended our studies toward the synthesis and characterisation of carbon nanotube based composites in order to obtain low-weight composites of extraordinary mechanical properties.