A Superconducting-Nanowire Three-Terminal Electrothermal Device

• Published in: Nano letters Vol. 14; no. 10; pp. 5748 - 5753
• Main Authors: McCaughan, Adam N, Berggren, Karl K
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Washington, DC American Chemical Society 08.10.2014
• Subjects: Amplification; Applied sciences; Cross-disciplinary physics: materials science; rheology; Devices; Electronics; Exact sciences and technology; Logic; Magnetic fields; Materials science; Methods of nanofabrication; Molecular electronics, nanoelectronics; Nanocrystalline materials; Nanolithography; Nanoscale materials and structures: fabrication and characterization; Nanowires; Photons; Physics; Quantum wires; Semiconductor electronics. Microelectronics. Optoelectronics. Solid state devices; Superconductivity; Superconductor; digital; photon; amplifier; logic; cryotron; Amplification; Thin films; Superconducting thin films; Superconducting films; Electron beam lithography; Detectors; Josephson junctions; Nanowires; Nanostructured materials; Adders; AND circuit
• ISSN: 1530-6984; 1530-6992
• DOI: 10.1021/nl502629x

Superconducting electronics based on Josephson junctions are used to sense and process electronic signals with minimal loss; however, they are ultrasensitive to magnetic fields, limited in their amplification capabilities, and difficult to manufacture. We have developed a 3-terminal, nanowire-based superconducting electrothermal device which has no Josephson junctions. This device, which we call the nanocryotron, can be patterned from a single thin film of superconducting material with conventional electron-beam lithography. The nanocryotron has a demonstrated gain of >20, can drive impedances of 100 kΩ, and operates in typical ambient magnetic fields. We have additionally applied it both as a digital logic element in a half-adder circuit, and as a digital amplifier for superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors pulses. The nanocryotron has immediate applications in classical and quantum communications, photon sensing, and astronomy, and its input characteristics are suitable for integration with existing superconducting technologies.