Global minimizer for the Ginzburg-Landau functional of an inhomogeneous superconductor

Abstract

In this paper, we prove that the global minimizer of the Ginzburg-Landau functional of an inhomogeneous superconductor in an external magnetic field below the first critical field H-c1 is the vortexless solution. Here, H-c1 is defined as the value of h(ex), the applied field, for which the minimal energy among vortexless configurations is equal to the minimal energy among single-vortex configurations. (C) 2002 American Institute of Physics.