Atomic scale 0-pi transition in a high-Tc   superconductor/ferromagnetic-insulator/high-T superconductor Josephson   junction
  We study the Josephson transport in a high-Tc superconductor/ferromagnetic-insulator(FI)/high-Tc superconductor numerically. We found the formation of a pi-junction in such systems. More remarkably the ground state of such junction alternates between 0- and pi-states when thickness of FI is increasing by a single atomic layer. We propose an experimental setup for observing the atomic-scale 0-pi transition. Such FI-based pi-junctions can be used to implement highly-coherent quantum bits. 
Shiro Kawabata, Yukio Tanaka, Yasuhiro Asano
cond-mat.supr-con cond-mat.mes-hall quant-ph