| The high temperature superconductors HgBa2CuO 4+delta (Hg1201) and Bi2SrCa2Cu2O 8+delta (Bi2212) have been treated with 17O for both nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) sensitivity and various electronic properties. Subsequently, NMR experiments were performed on Hg1201 and Bi2212 to reveal the nature of the pseudogap, in the normal state, and vortex phases, in the superconducting state.;NMR has been performed on 17O in an underdoped Hg1201 crystal with a superconducting transition transition temperature of 74 K to look for circulating orbital currents proposed theoretically and inferred from neutron scattering. The measurements reveal narrow spectra which preclude static local fields in the pseudogap phase at the apical site, suggesting that the moments observed with neutrons are fluctuating or the orbital current ordering is not the correct model for the neutron scattering observation. The fine detail of the NMR frequency shifts at the apical oxygen site are consistent with a dipolar field from the Cu+2 site and diamagnetism below the superconducting transition.;It has been predicted that superconducting vortices should be electrically charged and that this effect is particularly enhanced for high temperature superconductors. Here it is shown that the Abrikosov vortex lattice, characteristic of the mixed state of superconductors, will become unstable at sufficiently high magnetic field if there is charge trapped on the vortex core for highly anisotropic superconductors. NMR measurements of the magnetic fields generated by vortices in Bi2212 single crystals provide evidence for an electro-statically driven vortex lattice reconstruction with the magnitude of charge on each vortex pancake of 2x10-3e, depending on doping, in line with theoretical estimates.;Competition with magnetism is at the heart of high temperature superconductivity, most intensely felt near a vortex core. To investigate vortex magnetism spatially resolved NMR has been used, finding a strongly non-monotonic relationship between the NMR spectrum and T1-1 contrary to the expectation for Doppler shifted quasiparticles. A spin-density wave associated with the vortex core in Bi2212 has been found, similar to "checkerboard" patterns in the local density of electronic states reported from scanning tunneling microscope experiments. Both the spin-modulation amplitude and decay length have been determined in fields up to 30 T. |
