Inverse proximity effect and influence of disorder on triplet supercurrents in strongly spin-polarized ferromagnets

Journal article, 2013

We discuss the Josephson effect in strongly spin-polarized ferromagnets where triplet correlations are induced by means of spin-active interface scattering, extending our earlier work [R. Grein, M. Eschrig, G. Metalidis, and G. Schon, Phys. Rev. Lett. 102, 227005 (2009)] by including impurity scattering in the ferromagnetic bulk and the inverse proximity effect in a fully self-consistent way. Our quasiclassical approach accounts for the differences of Fermi momenta and Fermi velocities between the two spin bands of the ferromagnet, and thereby overcomes an important shortcoming of previous work within the framework of Usadel theory. We show that nonmagnetic disorder in conjunction with spin-dependent Fermi velocities may induce a reversal of the spin current as a function of temperature.