Fluctuation Phenomena in Superconductors

Abstract

The review is devoted to the detailed description of the fluctuation phenomena in superconductors. Developing phenomenological methods through the first five sections we deal with the direct fluctuation pair contributions only. The indirect fluctuation effects are discussed in the last two sections, devoted to the microscopic justification of the time dependent Ginzburg-Landau equation, the description of the microscopic theory of fluctuations, and discussion of their manifestations in various physical properties of superconductors. The first six sections are written in detail, so they can serve as a textbook. On the contrary, in the last section a wide panorama of fluctuation effects in different physical properties of superconductors is presented. Thus this section has more of a handbook character, and the intermediate calculations often are omitted.