The Single-Electron Transistor as an Ultrasensitive Microwave Detector

IEEE Transactions on Applied Superconductivity

Volumn 5, Issue 2, 1995, Pages 2604-2607

  Hergenrother, J M ^a   Lu, J G ^a   Tinkham, M ^a  

^a HARVARD UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

AMPLIFIERS (ELECTRONIC); DETECTORS; ELECTRIC CURRENT MEASUREMENT; ELECTRON TUNNELING; ELECTRONS; MICROWAVES; PHOTONS; SUPERCONDUCTING MATERIALS; TRANSISTORS;

PHOTON ASSISTED TUNNELING; QUASIPARTICLES; SINGLE ELECTRON TUNNELING TRANSISTOR; SUPERCONDUCTING ISLANDS; ULTRASENSITIVE MICROWAVE DETECTOR;

SUPERCONDUCTING DEVICES;

EID: 0029327026     PISSN: 10518223     EISSN: 15582515     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1109/77.403123     Document Type: Article

References (14)

1. For an introduction to single-electron charging effects see Single Charge Tunneling, H. Grabert and M. H. Devoret, Eds., New York: Plenum Press, 1992.
2. J. M. Hergenrother, M. T. Tuominen, and M. Tinkham, “Charge transport by Andreev reflection through a mesoscopic superconducting island,” Phys. Rev. Lett. 72, 1742 (1994).
3. M. T. Tuominen, J. M. Hergenrother, T. S. Tighe, and M. Tinkham, “Experimental evidence for parity-based 2e periodicity in a superconducting single-electron tunneling transistor,” Phys. Rev. Lett. 69, 1997 (1992).
4. J. M. Hergenrother, J. G. Lu, M. T. Tuominen, D. C. Ralph, and M. Tinkham, “Photon-assisted tunneling in the single-electron transistor with a superconducting island,” unpublished.
5. T. M. Eiles, J. M. Martinis, and M. H. Devoret, “Even-odd asymmetry of a superconductor as revealed by the Coulomb blockade of Andreev reflection,” Phys. Rev. Lett. 70, 1862 (1993).
6. J. M. Hergenrother, M. T. Tuominen, J. G. Lu, D. C. Ralph, and M. Tinkham, “Charge transport and photon-assisted tunneling in the NSN single-electron transistor,” to appear in Physica B, Proc. NATO ARW “Mesoscopic Superconductivity”, 1994.
7. J. M. Martinis and M. Nahum, “Effect of environmental noise on the accuracy of Coulomb-blockade devices,” Phys. Rev. B48, 18316 (1993).
8. Tenv=4 K is quite reasonable because the warmest surfaces of the inner vacuum chamber in our dilution refrigerator are at this temperature.
9. The fit values for αRenv are much smaller than the high-frequency lead impedance Renv-100 Ω. This suggests that it only takes only a small fraction of the 4 K blackbody radiation to produce the observed effects.
10. F. W. J. Hekking, L. I. Glazman, K. A. Matveev, and R. I. Shekhter, “Coulomb blockade of two-electron tunneling,” Phys. Rev. Lett. 70, 4138(1993).
11. G. Schön and A. D. Zaikin, “Parity effects on electron tunneling through small superconducting islands,” Europhys. Lett. 26, 695 (1994).
12. The simple picture given here breaks down for absorbed power levels Pabs>hfTescbecause a second photon is frequently absorbed before the quasiparticle trapped on the island can escape. Although simulations can account for processes such as this, the device sensitivity is diminished when Pabs>hfTesc.
13. The maximum response frequency of this device («Гesc) will be limited by the bandwidth of this current measurement in most cases.
14. For a general review see P. L. Richards, “Bolometers for infrared and millimeter waves,” J. of Appl. Phys. 76, 1 (1994). See also M. Nahum and J. Martinis, Appl. Phys. Lett. 63, 3075 (1993).