Single Electron Effects in Small Tunnel Junctions

Lambert J. Geerligs

G. Falci, Vladimir Bubanja, Gerd Schön

The tunnelling of single electrons in small-capacitance normal tunnel junctions has been shown to be influenced by the fluctuations of the electrodynamic environment. We study the effect of an external circuit with arbitrary impedance on the tunnelling of quasi-particles in voltage-driven Josephson junctions and find even more dramatic effects than in normal junctions. We also discuss the influence of the environment on the tunnelling of Cooper pairs at finite temperatures.

M. Kataoka

Thorsten Holst, D. Esteve, C. Urbina +1 more

We have measured the current-voltage characteristic of a small capacitance tunnel junction coupled to a transmission line resonator. We calibrate the resonator using the sharp resonances displayed by the junction in the superconducting state, which corresponds to the pumping of the modes of the resonator by the ac Josephson current. With this calibration, we explain quantitatively the nonlinearity of the junction characteristic in the normal state as being due to the process by which a single electron tunnels by emitting a photon, the basic process of the theory of the effect of the electromagnetic environment on tunneling.

R. J. Schoelkopf, S. H. Moseley, Carl M. Stahle +2 more

We discuss the design for a submillimeter-wave photometer, using a combination of superconducting and single-electron devices, which would have high quantum efficiency, very low noise-equivalent powers, and eventually even submicrosecond timing resolution. The absorption of above-gap photons occurs in a small strip of superconducting Al, whose normal-state resistance can be matched efficiently to an antenna of a higher gap (Nb) superconductor. The quasiparticles produced by photon absorption are then confined via Andreev reflection, and forced to tunnel through a small SIS tunnel junction. The tunneling time is much shorter than the known (>10 /spl mu/s) quasiparticle recombination time, so collection efficiency will be high. The device sensitivity would be limited by the small subgap current in the high-quality Al/AlO/sub x//Al tunnel junction at temperatures (100 mK) well below T/sub c/. Scaling based on the larger junctions used in X-ray detector applications suggests that the total dark current can be <0.1 pA, or of order 10/sup 5/ electrons/second, corresponding to an NEP of less than 10/sup -19/ W//spl radic/Hz at 500 microns (600 GHz). The photocurrent will be measured using a fast single-electron transistor (RF-SET), which allows a shot-noise-limited performance even for the very small currents delivered from this low capacitance and high impedance SIS junction. Results of initial fabrication and dc characterization of an integrated photodetector are also given.

F. Frémont