Low-Temperature Solid State Synthesis and Characterization of Superconducting Vanadium Nitride

Superconducting vanadium nitride (VN) is successfully synthesized by a solid-state reaction of vanadium pentoxide, sodium amide and sulfur in an autoclave at a relatively low temperature (240–400^\circ\!C). The obtained samples are characterized by x-ray diffraction, x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and transmission electron microscopy. The result of the magnetization of the obtained VN product as a function of temperature indicates that the onset superconducting transition temperature is about 8.4 K. Furthermore, the possible reaction mechanism is also discussed.