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IEEE Transactions on Applied Superconductivity

Full EM Design Method For HTS MMIC Josephson Mixers

Ting Zhang, Xiang Gao, Jia Du, Yingjie Jay Guo

Published Jan 30, 2018• 5 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We report the full electromagnetic (EM) design and simulation method, and applied it to develop a 34-GHz high-temperature superconducting (HTS) microwave monolithic integrated circuit Josephson mixer. The mixer is modeled in EM simulation software, high-frequency simulation structural simulator, with the junction area modeled as an excitation port with frequency-dependent impedance. Impedance matching between the junction and RF/IF ports is then optimized accordingly. Module design is carried out for the optimized HTS Josephson mixer, and the cavity resonance issue is investigated and eliminated. The HTS mixer module was experimentally developed and measured to verify the simulation. The measured frequency response of the conversion gain agrees with the simulation results of combined RF and IF transmission loss.

DOI
10.1109/tasc.2018.2796541

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We report the full electromagnetic (EM) design and simulation method, and applied it to develop a 34-GHz high-temperature superconducting (HTS) microwave monolithic integrated circuit Josephson mixer. The mixer is modeled in EM simulation software, high-frequency simulation structural simulator, with the junction area modeled as an excitation port with frequency-dependent impedance. Impedance matching between the junction and RF/IF ports is then optimized accordingly. Module design is carried out for the optimized HTS Josephson mixer, and the cavity resonance issue is investigated and eliminated. The HTS mixer module was experimentally developed and measured to verify the simulation. The measured frequency response of the conversion gain agrees with the simulation results of combined RF and IF transmission loss.
A high-temperature superconducting (HTS) Josephson frequency down-converting module is demonstrated. An HTS monolithic frequency down-converting circuit and a biasing circuit board for the Josephson device are packaged into the module. The monolithic circuit consists of HTS filters and a Josephson oscillator-mixer device, integrated on a single 10 mm × 20 mm chip of Y Ba 2 Cu 3 O 7− x (YBCO) film on MgO substrate. A compact, low-loss HTS step-impedance low-pass filter was designed for the intermediate frequency (IF) output port. The modeling, simulation and measurement results of the HTS low-pass filter are presented in this paper. The frequency response and dynamic range of the on-chip integrated HTS down-converting module are also described.
Abstract This paper presents a monolithic high-temperature superconducting K-band sub-harmonic Josephson mixer using a pair of reverse-biased Josephson junctions (JJs), which are biased using reversed DC current. The sub-harmonic mixer can provide higher conversion gain and stronger rejection of the even-order harmonics of the local oscillator signal. A matching circuit with several bandpass filters (BPFs) is designed to match the junctions and achieve a maximum conversion gain. Based on the circuit configuration and using the established Verilog-A JJ mixer model, transient simulation has been done in the circuit simulator. An electromagnetic (EM) model is built and simulated in a full-wave simulation environment, and the results reveal that the design realizes very low loss at 25 GHz, excellent port isolation and high conversion efficiency. A prototype has been fabricated and tested in a cryocooler at operating temperatures of 40 K and 20 K. Measurements have experimentally verified the novel radio frequency design and simulation results. Maximum conversion gains of −10.5 dB and −6.5 dB were obtained at 40 K and 20 K, respectively, with a bandwidth greater than 400 MHz and outstanding gain linearity. It is also predicted that the mixer performance can be further improved with higher critical current I c values and identical or similar I c values between two parallel junctions.
The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization has developed superconducting microwave monolithic integrated circuit (MMIC) mixers using step-edge Josephson junctions and on-chip filters, made from YBaCuO on MgO substrates. Integration into an MMIC results in a compact and efficiently coupled structure. These have been shown to have outstanding conversion efficiency, dynamic range, and linearity. We report here a range of simulations of this type of mixer. We have mainly used Josephson simulators and analyze the data in both the time and frequency domains. More recently, we have also used microwave simulators incorporating a novel Verilog-A Josephson junction model that we have developed. We have looked at the interactions of junction bias current, local oscillator power, and radio-frequency input power with conversion efficiency, dynamic range, and linearity. Good agreement is found overall with measurements.
© 2014 IOP Publishing Ltd. A high-Tc superconducting (HTS) monolithic microwave integrated circuit (MMIC) Josephson down-converter that approaches zero conversion loss is reported. The all-HTS YBa2Cu3O7-x thin-film circuit consists of a step-edge Josephson junction mixer, a 10-12 GHz bandpass filter for the RF input, a lowpass filter for the IF output and a resonant strip line for local oscillator isolation; all are integrated on a single 10 mm × 20 mm MgO substrate. The DC characteristics of the junction and its mixing properties have been experimentally studied and compared to the results of (a) a single Josephson mixer without the on-chip HTS filters, and (b) our previously reported MMIC down-converter which had very different junction characteristics. The Josephson junction parameters are analysed to give insight into their effect on the mixer performance.
High-Tc superconducting (HTS) receivers are promising candidates for terahertz (THz) communication applications due to their superior sensitivity and the cooling attainability with a miniature cryogenic system. Nevertheless, currently reported HTS mixers are mostly single-junction devices, and a more complicated architecture like the balanced configuration has not been investigated. This paper presents the design of a 600-GHz single-balanced HTS mixer, where detailed electromagnetic simulations are carried out to optimize the coupling efficiency and port isolation, as well as desired amplitude and phase relationship. To predict the noise and conversion performance, we present an innovative multiport network interleaving-based modeling method that enables powerful simulation verifications for single-balanced HTS Josephson mixers. Simulation results show that the presented device exhibits very good HTS mixer performance at the 600-GHz band, which validates the effectiveness of the design and the potential of the mixer for THz communication applications.
This paper presents an electromagnetic simulation of YBaCuO superconducting Josephson mixer for terahertz frequency band coupled with a log-periodic antenna. The proposed mixer design includes an on-chip diplexer and bias-tee. This approach reduces signal transmission losses, improves circuit isolation and makes the device very compact. The theoretical approach to the description of high-harmonic mixing proposed by the authors allows us to estimate the mixer conversion efficiency for experimentally obtained parameters of Josephson junctions. Comparison of experimental data with the theory showed the applicability of the suggested approach for a qualitative description of the mixer operation and allowed to estimate the efficiency of the simulated monolithic mixer.