Josephson Traveling-Wave Parametric Amplifier with Three-Wave Mixing

A. B. Zorin

doi:10.1103/PhysRevApplied.6.034006

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Josephson Traveling-Wave Parametric Amplifier with Three-Wave Mixing

A. B. Zorin

DOI 10.1103/PhysRevApplied.6.034006 · Physical Review Applied

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Abstract

We develop a concept of the traveling-wave Josephson parametric amplifier exploiting quadratic nonlinearity of a serial array of one-junction superconducting quantum interference devices (SQUIDs) embedded in a superconducting transmission line. The external magnetic flux applied to the SQUIDs makes it possible to efficiently control the shape of their current-phase relation and, hence, the balance between quadratic and cubic (Kerr-like) nonlinearities. This property allows us to operate in the favorable three-wave-mixing mode with a minimal phase mismatch, an exponential dependence of the power gain on number of sections N, a large bandwidth, a high dynamic range, and substantially separated signal (ωs) and pump (ωp) frequencies obeying the relation ωs+ωi=ωp, where ωi is the idler frequency. An estimation of the amplifier characteristics with typical experimental parameters, a pump frequency of 12 GHz, and N=300 yields a flat gain of 20 dB in the bandwidth of 5.6 GHz.