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Description
Microwave dielectrics are widely used to make resonators and filters in telecommunication systems. The production of thin films with high dielectric constant and low loss could potentially enable a marked reduction in the size of devices and systems. However, studies of these materials in thin film form are very sparse. In this research, experiments were carried out on practical high-performance dielectrics including ZrTiO4-ZnNb2O6 (ZTZN) and Ba(Co,Zn)1/3Nb2/3O3 (BCZN) with high dielectric constant and low loss tangent. Thin films were deposited by laser ablation on various substrates, with a systematical study of growth conditions like substrate temperature, oxygen pressure and annealing to optimize the film quality, and the compositional, microstructural, optical and electric properties were characterized. The deposited ZTZN films were randomly oriented polycrystalline on Si substrate and textured on MgO substrate with a tetragonal lattice change at elevated temperature. The BCZN films deposited on MgO substrate showed superior film quality relative to that on other substrates, which grow epitaxially with an orientation of (001) // MgO (001) and (100) // MgO (100) when substrate temperature was above 500 oC. In-situ annealing at growth temperature in 200 mTorr oxygen pressure was found to enhance the quality of the films, reducing the peak width of the X-ray Diffraction (XRD) rocking curve to 0.53o and the χmin of channeling Rutherford Backscattering Spectrometry (RBS) to 8.8% when grown at 800oC. Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) was used to study the topography and found a monotonic decrease in the surface roughness when the growth temperature increased. Optical absorption and transmission measurements were used to determine the energy bandgap and the refractive index respectively. A low-frequency dielectric constant of 34 was measured using a planar interdigital measurement structure. The resistivity of the film is ~3×1010 ohm·cm at room temperature and has an activation energy of thermal activated current of 0.66 eV.
ContributorsLi, You (Author) / Newman, Nathan (Thesis advisor) / Alford, Terry (Committee member) / Singh, Rakesh (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
In this research, our goal was to fabricate Josephson junctions that can be stably processed at 300°C or higher. With the purpose of integrating Josephson junction fabrication with the current semiconductor circuit fabrication process, back-end process temperatures (>350 °C) will be a key for producing large scale junction circuits reliably, which requires the junctions to be more thermally stable than current Nb/Al-AlOx/Nb junctions. Based on thermodynamics, Hf was chosen to produce thermally stable Nb/Hf-HfOx/Nb superconductor tunnel Josephson junctions that can be grown or processed at elevated temperatures. Also elevated synthesis temperatures improve the structural and electrical properties of Nb electrode layers that could potentially improve junction device performance. The refractory nature of Hf, HfO2 and Nb allow for the formation of flat, abrupt and thermally-stable interfaces. But the current Al-based barrier will have problems when using with high-temperature grown and high-quality Nb. So our work is aimed at using Nb grown at elevated temperatures to fabricate thermally stable Josephson tunnel junctions. As a junction barrier metal, Hf was studied and compared with the traditional Al-barrier material. We have proved that Hf-HfOx is a good barrier candidate for high-temperature synthesized Josephson junction. Hf deposited at 500 °C on Nb forms flat and chemically abrupt interfaces. Nb/Hf-HfOx/Nb Josephson junctions were synthesized, fabricated and characterized with different oxidizing conditions. The results of materials characterization and junction electrical measurements are reported and analyzed. We have improved the annealing stability of Nb junctions and also used high-quality Nb grown at 500 °C as the bottom electrode successfully. Adding a buffer layer or multiple oxidation steps improves the annealing stability of Josephson junctions. We also have attempted to use the Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) method for the growth of Hf oxide as the junction barrier and got tunneling results.
ContributorsHuang, Mengchu, 1987- (Author) / Newman, Nathan (Thesis advisor) / Rowell, John M. (Committee member) / Singh, Rakesh K. (Committee member) / Chamberlin, Ralph (Committee member) / Wang, Robert (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
This work is an investigation into the information provided by the concurrent use of in situ reflection high energy electron diffraction (RHEED) and reflection electron energy loss spectroscopy (REELS). The two analytical methods were employed during growth of metal, semiconductor and superconductor thin films by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE). Surface sensitivity of the REELS spectrometer was found to be less than 1 nm for 20 KeV electrons incident at a 2 degree angle to an atomically flat film surface, agreeing with the standard electron escape depth data when adjusted incident angle. Film surface topography was found to strongly influence the REELS spectra and this was correlated with in situ RHEED patterns and ex situ analysis by comparison with atomic force microscopy (AFM). It was observed in all the experimental results that from very smooth films the plasmon peak maxima did not fall at the predicted surface plasmon values but at slightly higher energies, even for nearly atomically flat films. This suggested the REELS plasmon loss spectra are always a combination of surface and bulk plasmon losses. The resulting summation of these two types of losses shifted the peak to below the bulk plasmon value but held its minimum to a higher energy than the pure surface plasmon value. Curve fitting supported this conclusion.
ContributorsStrawbridge, Brett William (Author) / Newman, Nathan (Thesis advisor) / Chamberlin, Ralph (Committee member) / Rizzo, Nicholas (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
Measurements of the response of superconducting nanowire single photon detector (SNSPD) devices to changes in various forms of input power can be used for characterization of the devices and for probing device-level physics. Two niobium nitride (NbN) superconducting nanowires developed for use as SNSPD devices are embedded as the inductive (L) component in resonant inductor/capacitor (LC) circuits coupled to a microwave transmission line. The capacitors are low loss commercial chip capacitors which limit the internal quality factor of the resonators to approximately $Qi = 170$. The resonator quality factor, approximately $Qr = 23$, is dominated by the coupling to the feedline and limits the detection bandwidth to on the order of 1MHz. In our experiments with this first generation device, we measure the response of the SNSPD devices to changes in thermal and optical power in both the time domain and the frequency domain. Additionally, we explore the non-linear response of the devices to an applied bias current. For these nanowires, we find that the band-gap energy is $\Delta_0 \approx 1.1$meV and that the density of states at the Fermi energy is $N_0 \sim 10^{10}$/eV/$\mu$m$^3$.
We present the results of experimentation with a superconducting nanowire that can be operated in two detection modes: i) as a kinetic inductance detector (KID) or ii) as a single photon detector (SPD). When operated as a KID mode in linear mode, the detectors are AC-biased with tones at their resonant frequencies of 45.85 and 91.81MHz. When operated as an SPD in Geiger mode, the resonators are DC biased through cryogenic bias tees and each photon produces a sharp voltage step followed by a ringdown signal at the resonant frequency of the detector. We show that a high AC bias in KID mode is inferior for photon counting experiments compared to operation in a DC-biased SPD mode due to the small fraction of time spent near the critical current with an AC bias. We find a photon count rate of $\Gamma_{KID} = 150~$photons/s/mA in a critically biased KID mode and a photon count rate of $\Gamma_{SPD} = 10^6~$photons/s/mA in SPD mode.
This dissertation additionally presents simulations of a DC-biased, frequency-multiplexed readout of SNSPD devices in Advanced Design System (ADS), LTspice, and Sonnet. A multiplexing factor of 100 is achievable with a total count rate of $>5$MHz. This readout could enable a 10000-pixel array for astronomy or quantum communications. Finally, we present a prototype array design based on lumped element components. An early implementation of the array is presented with 16 pixels in the frequency range of 74.9 to 161MHz. We find good agreement between simulation and experimental data in both the time domain and the frequency domain and present modifications for future versions of the array.
We present the results of experimentation with a superconducting nanowire that can be operated in two detection modes: i) as a kinetic inductance detector (KID) or ii) as a single photon detector (SPD). When operated as a KID mode in linear mode, the detectors are AC-biased with tones at their resonant frequencies of 45.85 and 91.81MHz. When operated as an SPD in Geiger mode, the resonators are DC biased through cryogenic bias tees and each photon produces a sharp voltage step followed by a ringdown signal at the resonant frequency of the detector. We show that a high AC bias in KID mode is inferior for photon counting experiments compared to operation in a DC-biased SPD mode due to the small fraction of time spent near the critical current with an AC bias. We find a photon count rate of $\Gamma_{KID} = 150~$photons/s/mA in a critically biased KID mode and a photon count rate of $\Gamma_{SPD} = 10^6~$photons/s/mA in SPD mode.
This dissertation additionally presents simulations of a DC-biased, frequency-multiplexed readout of SNSPD devices in Advanced Design System (ADS), LTspice, and Sonnet. A multiplexing factor of 100 is achievable with a total count rate of $>5$MHz. This readout could enable a 10000-pixel array for astronomy or quantum communications. Finally, we present a prototype array design based on lumped element components. An early implementation of the array is presented with 16 pixels in the frequency range of 74.9 to 161MHz. We find good agreement between simulation and experimental data in both the time domain and the frequency domain and present modifications for future versions of the array.
ContributorsSchroeder, Edward, Ph.D (Author) / Mauskopf, Philip (Thesis advisor) / Chamberlin, Ralph (Committee member) / Lindsay, Stuart (Committee member) / Newman, Nathan (Committee member) / Easson, Damien (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2018