Interlayer vortices and edge dislocations in high-temperature superconductors

The interaction of an edge dislocation made of half the superconducting plane with a magnetic interlayer vortex is considered within the framework of the Lawrence-Doniach model with negative as well as positive Josephson interlayer coupling. In the first case the binding energy of the vortex and the dislocation has been calculated by employing a variational procedure. The current distribution around the bound vortex turns out to be asymmetric. In the second case the dislocation carries a spontaneous magnetic half vortex, whose binding energy with the dislocation turns out to be infinite. The half-vortex energy has been calculated by the same variational procedure. Implications of the possible presence of such half vortices for the properties of high-temperature sueprconductors are discussed. We suggest employing artificially made superconductor-ferromagnet superlattices with the half plane removed to observe fractional vortices.