We have studied the in- and out-of-plane magnetic penetration depths in the hole- doped iron based superconductor Ba1−xKxFe2As2 (Tc≈ 30K). The study was performed on single crystals grown from different fluxes and we find that the results are nearly the same. The in-plane London penetration depth λab does not show exponential saturation at low temperature, as would be expected from a fully gapped superconductor. Instead, λab(T) shows a power-law behavior, λ∝Tn (n≈2), down to T≈0.02Tc, similar to the electron doped Ba(Fe1−xCox)2As2. The penetration depth anisotropy γλ=λc(T)/λab(T) increases upon cooling, opposite to the trend observed in the anisotropy of the upper critical field, γξ=Hc2⊥c(0)/Hc2∥c(0). These are universal characteristics of both the electron and hole doped 122 systems, suggesting unconventional superconductivity. The behavior of the in-plane superfluid density ρab(T) is discussed in light of existing theoretical models proposed for the iron pnictides superconductors.
@article{arxiv.0902.1804,
title = {Non-exponential London penetration depth in Ba$_{1-}$K$_{x}$Fe$_{2}$As$_{2}$ single crystals},
author = {C. Martin and R. T. Gordon and M. A. Tanatar and H. Kim and N. Ni and S. L. Bud'ko and P. C. Canfield and H. Luo and H. H. Wen and Z. Wang and A. B. Vorontsov and V. G. Kogan and R. Prozorov},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0902.1804},
year = {2009}
}