Scattering to different vortex polarity in coupled long Josephson junctions

Parag Ghosh, Fernando Sols, Tony Leggett

Kirill G. Fedorov, Anastasia V. Shcherbakova, R. Schäfer +1 more

Experiments towards realizing a readout of superconducting qubits by using ballistic Josephson vortices are reported. We measured the microwave radiation induced by a fluxon moving in an annular Josephson junction. By coupling a flux qubit as a current dipole to the annular junction, we detect periodic variations of the fluxon's oscillation frequency versus magnetic flux through the qubit. We found that the scattering of a fluxon on a current dipole can lead to the acceleration of a fluxon regardless of a dipole polarity. We use the perturbation theory and numerical simulations of the perturbed sine-Gordon equation to analyze our results.

J. Kent Harbaugh, D. Stroud

Kazuhiro Yoshida, K. Hamasaki, Fumi Irie +1 more

Ramesh P. Dhungana

In this dissertation work, I investigate the decoherence time of a Josephson vortex qubit (JVQ) and the level of entanglement between two JVQs. A JVQ may be fabricated by embedding two closely spaced microresistors in the insulating layer of a long Josephson junction (LJJ). The phase dynamics of the JVQ may be described by using the perturbed sine-Gordon equation. This sine-Gordon equation is transformed to describe the motion of fluxons in the double-well potential. An oscillation of a fluxon in this double-well potential is mapped onto a quantum two-state system. The coherent oscillation of fluxons in the two-state system decays due to dissipation and noises in the LJJ. To estimate the decoherence time, the two-state system in a noisy environment is described by using the spin-boson Hamiltonian. The time evolution of the system is studied by using the generalized master equation. Finally, I use the experimental parameters for Nb-AlOx-Nb Josephson junction to estimate the decoherence time. The result shows that JVQ has a very long decoherence time (several tens of microseconds) compared to other Josephson qubits. Entanglement between two coupled JVQs is estimated by computing the concurrence. The concurrence depends on the ground-state energy splitting due to the one-fluxon and two-fluxon tunneling between the potential minima of the two coupled JVQs. The tunneling amplitude between the potential minima depends on the junction parameters such as magnetic induction effect S, the separation distance ℓ, and the pinning strength of the microresistors ϵ. The estimation of the concurrence shows that a near perfect entanglement may be achieved by using the experimentally accessible values of the parameters. Also the study shows that the tunneling amplitude of the fluxon between the potential minima of the JVQs may be increased by coupling the junction with a resonant cavity. This characteristic of the junction-cavity coupling may be exploited to control the entanglement between two JVQs.

V. M. Kaurov, Anatoly B. Kuklov

Dark soliton (DS) and Josephson vortex (JV) in quasi-1D long Bose Josephson junction (BJJ) can be interconverted by tuning Josephson coupling. Rates of the interconversion as well as of the thermally activated phase-slip effect, resulting in the JV switching its vorticity, have been evaluated. The role of quantum phase-slip in creating superposition of JVs with opposite vorticities as a qubit is discussed as well. Utilization of the JV for controlled and coherent transfer of atomic Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) is suggested.