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Superconducting emitters of THz radiation

Nature Photonics volume 7, pages 702–710 (2013)Cite this article

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Abstract

Layered superconductors such as the copper-oxide high-temperature superconductor Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+δ are emerging as compact sources of coherent continuous-wave electromagnetic radiation in the subterahertz and terahertz frequency ranges. The basis of their operation is the Josephson effect, which intrinsically occurs between the superconducting layers. The Josephson effect naturally converts a direct-current voltage into a high-frequency electric current. Therefore, a unique property of the devices reviewed here is the wide tunability of their frequency by varying the bias voltage. Recently, emission powers of free-space radiation of several hundreds of microwatts and emission linewidths as low as 6 MHz at 600 GHz have been achieved. These devices are promising for new applications in imaging, medical diagnostics, spectroscopy and security.

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Figure 1: Intrinsic Josephson junctions and THz emission from BSCCO.
Figure 2: Tunable THz emission from BSCCO resonators.
Figure 3: Hot-spot formation.
Figure 4: Emission linewidth and tunability in the hot-spot regime.
Figure 5: THz imaging.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank W. K. Kwok, A. E. Koshelev, T. Benseman, B. Gross, H. B. Wang, V. P. Koshelets, R. G. Mints, D. Koelle, T. Kashiwagi, I. Kakeya, T. Yamamoto, R. A. Klemm, M. Tsujimoto, H. Minami and M. Tachiki for many helpful discussions. U.W. acknowledges support from the U.S. Department of Energy (BES), K.K. acknowledges support from the Japanese Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) and the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST), and R.K. acknowledges support from Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Materials Science Division, Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, 60439, Illinois, USA

    Ulrich Welp

  2. Division of Materials Science, Faculty of Pure and Applied Sciences, University of Tsukuba, Tsukuba, Ibaraki, 305-8573, Japan

    Kazuo Kadowaki

  3. Physikalisches Institut and Center for Collective Quantum Phenomena in LISA+, Universität Tübingen, D-72076, Tübingen, Germany

    Reinhold Kleiner

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Correspondence to Ulrich Welp.

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U.W. is a named inventor on three patents (US patents 7,610,071, 7,715,892 and 8,026,487) related to superconducting THz sources. K.K. is a named inventor on two patents (Japanese patents 5229859 and 5229876) related to superconducting THz sources and three patent applications (application numbers 2008-066110, 2008-186590 and 2012-031205).

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Welp, U., Kadowaki, K. & Kleiner, R. Superconducting emitters of THz radiation. Nature Photon 7, 702–710 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2013.216

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