This README.txt describes the data contained in the accompanying dataset: 

Curran, P. J. et al. Spontaneous symmetry breaking in vortex systems with two repulsive lengthscales. Sci. Rep. 5, 15569; doi: 10.1038/srep15569 (2015).


%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Fig. 1 

This figure shows X-ray diffraction data (XRD) and atomic force micrscopy (AFM) images for the 160nm MgB2 thin film.

Insets (a) and (b) are 128x128 pixel AFM images obtained with the Asylum research MFP-3D microscope and plotted with nanotec electronica WSxM freeware.

The matlab script plot_XRDdata3a.m (also available .txt) contains comments that explains the data contained in XRD text files:

XRD_Si_pdf.txt - The powder diffraction lines of Si
XRD_MgB2_pdf.txt - The powder diffraction lines of MgB2
MgB2_Expt_XRDdata.txt - The experimental X-ray diffraction data of our 160nm MgB2 film.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Fig. 2

This figure contains Hc2(T) data of the MgB2 thinfilms.

The experimental data were obtained via 4-point transport measurements conducted in a custom made glass cryostat at the university of Bath using the following apparatus.

Superconducting coil power supply: Kepco BOP 50V-8A.
Lock-in amplifier: Stranford research systems SR830 DSP.
Data acquisition with Labview 12.0.

The theoretical data were obtained using the formulation described in the text and simulated with MathCAD v12.0

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Fig. 3

This figure contains scanning Hall probe images acquired with the Nanomagnetics Ltd SHPM, which was originally developed at Bath.

The Hall probes were fabricated at the University of Bath following a custommade recipe.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Figs. 4 and 5

These figures contain histograms of the vortex-vortex nearest neighbour and angular separations respectively. The vortex locations were identified by eye and manually entered into Matlab v1012b.

The nearest neighbour separations were then calculated using the inbuilt Matlab function DelaunayTri.m

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Fig. 6

See description of Fig. 3.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Fig. 7

This figure shows GL simulations of the vortex positions. They were generated using the equations described in the manuscript text and simulated using Mathamatica 10.

The data are contained in Origin .opj files.

%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%