Proximity effects and characteristic lengths in ferromagnet-superconductor structures

We present an extensive theoretical investigation of the proximity effects that occur in clean ferromagnet/superconductor (F/S) systems. We use a numerical method to solve self-consistently the Bogoliubov-de Gennes equations in the continuum. We obtain the pair amplitude and the local density of states, and use these results to extract the relevant lengths characterizing the leakage of superconductivity into the magnet and to study spin splitting into the superconductor. These phenomena are investigated as a function of parameters such as temperature, magnet polarization, interfacial scattering, sample size, and Fermi wave vector mismatch, all of which turn out to have important influence on the results. These results should help characterize and analyze future data and are shown to be in agreement with existing experiments.