A study on topology of trapped magnetic field, microstructure and local chemical composition in top-seeded melt-textured samples

The mapping of trapped magnetic field in melt-textured Y-Ba-Cu-O bulk ceramic composites have been used to evaluate their macroscopic grain structure. In this work, we studied the relation between topology of trapped magnetic field, the applied one, microstructure and local chemical composition. We show that trapped field domains do not necessarily match crystallographic ones and frontiers also occur at regions in which the field trapping capability is going to saturation at fast rates. We confront trapped field and chemical composition mappings to show that the last may be one major feature responsible for local saturation. The results show that an yttrium excess is observed at the boundaries between trapping field domains.