ABSTRACT
Spintronics with superconductors has been developing speedily since a number of pivotal experiments established its feasibility at the end of the 1990s and beginning of the 2000s. The emerging field of superconducting spintronics has the goal of developing memory and logic devices based on the unique properties resulting from the combination of superconductivity with spin-ordered states. In general, a Fermi-surface mismatch between the superconductor and the ferromagnet at an interface leads to a contact resistance. Scattering of quasiparticles at interfaces is described by an interface scattering matrix, which connects incoming and outgoing Bloch waves. The spatial oscillations of the short-ranged pair amplitudes are strongly damped for diffusive systems, in stark contrast to the ballistic case, where the oscillation wavelength is decoupled from the decay length. The spin-valve effect consists of a superconductor-ferromagnet device in which a change in the magnetization profile across the device leads to a change of its superconducting properties.
