Magnetic vortex and unsaturated magnetization components in highly oriented pyrolytic graphite

Observation of ferromagnetic and granular superconductive features in highly-oriented-pyrolytic-graphite (HOPG) has recently attracted an important attention. We report a novel temperature dependent XRD and SQUID investigation of HOPG in the temperature range from 300.15 to 77.15 K. Unusual hysteresis features indicate the possible presence of vortex states in conditions of magnetic field approximately perpendicular to the HOPG layers. This interpretation is further supported by additional measurements performed on intermediate lamellae extracted by exfoliation. Evidence of a possible structural-transition in the c-axis of HOPG in the temperature range between 77 K and 100K is also provided by using the Rietveld refinement method. ZFC and FC measurements performed at high field values of 5000-10000 Oe, together with mFC-mZFC subtraction, highlight absence of a sharp depletion of the difference between magnetization signals towards zero. These observations may indicate the possible presence of additional unsaturated weak features, which are ascribed to superconductive signals as previously predicted by Scheike et al (Scheike et al 2013 Carbon; 59:140).