Surface superconductivity in a wedge

For a superconducting wedge-like sample with angle α, the superconducting state is described and the phase boundaries are analyzed in the framework of the variational approach to the linearized Ginzburg-Landau equation. The nucleation of the superconducting state is shown to be substantially enhanced in the vicinity of the wedge's edge, where the local surface critical field H c3 exceeds the bulk upper critical field H c2 by the factor η(α) = H c3 / H c 2 depending on α. The enhancement factor η(α) is 1.69 for α = π and is increased up to 3.79 for α = 0.44π.