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Phonon traps reduce the quasiparticle density in superconducting circuits

Authors :
M. I. Martínez
Laura Cardani
Daria Gusenkova
Lukas Grünhaupt
M. Vignati
Francesco Valenti
Wolfgang Wernsdorfer
Sebastian T. Skacel
Thibault Charpentier
Clement Gouriou
Oliver Sander
Gianluigi Catelani
Ioan Pop
Julian Ferrero
Marc Lagoin
Alexey V. Ustinov
Fabio Henriques
Source :
Zaguán: Repositorio Digital de la Universidad de Zaragoza, Universidad de Zaragoza, Applied physics letters 115(21), 212601-(2019). doi:10.1063/1.5124967, Zaguán. Repositorio Digital de la Universidad de Zaragoza, instname
Publication Year :
2019
Publisher :
AIP Publishing, 2019.

Abstract

Out of equilibrium quasiparticles (QPs) are one of the main sources of decoherence in superconducting quantum circuits and one that is particularly detrimental in devices with high kinetic inductance, such as high impedance resonators, qubits, and detectors. Despite significant progress in the understanding of QP dynamics, pinpointing their origin and decreasing their density remain outstanding tasks. The cyclic process of recombination and generation of QPs implies the exchange of phonons between the superconducting thin film and the underlying substrate. Reducing the number of substrate phonons with frequencies exceeding the spectral gap of the superconductor should result in a reduction of QPs. Indeed, we demonstrate that surrounding high impedance resonators made of granular aluminum (grAl) with lower gapped thin film aluminum islands increases the internal quality factors of the resonators in the single photon regime, suppresses the noise, and reduces the rate of observed QP bursts. The aluminum islands are positioned far enough from the resonators to be electromagnetically decoupled, thus not changing the resonator frequency nor the loading. We therefore attribute the improvements observed in grAl resonators to phonon trapping at frequencies close to the spectral gap of aluminum, well below the grAl gap.

Details

ISSN :
10773118 and 00036951
Volume :
115
Database :
OpenAIRE
Journal :
Applied Physics Letters
Accession number :
edsair.doi.dedup.....87783dcc7dc30e3450069ba1fe1f8118
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5124967