Defect phenomena in superconducting oxides and analogous ceramic oxides

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Abstract
The authors discuss the defect phenomena in superconducting oxides. They survey those aspects of oxide superconductors which relate them most closely to conventional ceramic oxides, concentrating on processes and behaviour related to defects. They also identify areas of difference between two types of oxide. Theoretical modelling of conventional oxides has been extremely effective, and they emphasize that some of these modelling tools can be exploited for the superconducting oxides too. In particular, they stress those methods and ideas that provide a framework for understanding behaviour, those that provide a database of good quantitative experiments and those that provide an established and tested approach to quantitative modelling as a guide to prediction, optimization and extrapolation. Much progress has been made in both theory and experiment, but some problems do remain and these have not been omitted from the discussions. There is potential to exploit past work on defects in oxides, so as to control defect processes and microstructure and hence to enhance performance.