Single-asperity sliding friction across the superconducting phase transition

In sliding friction, different energy dissipation channels have been proposed, including phonon and electron systems, plastic deformation, and crack formation. However, how energy is coupled into these channels is debated, and especially, the relevance of electronic dissipation remains elusive. Here, we present friction experiments of a single-asperity sliding on a high-T(c) superconductor from 40 to 300 kelvin. Overall, friction decreases with temperature as generally expected for nanoscale energy dissipation. However, we also find a large peak around T(c). We model these results by a superposition of phononic and electronic friction, where the electronic energy dissipation vanishes below T(c). In particular, we find that the electronic friction constitutes a constant offset above T(c), which vanishes below T(c) with a power law in agreement with Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer theory. While current point contact friction models usually neglect such friction contributions, our study shows that electronic and phononic friction contributions can be of equal size.