title: A superconducting-nanowire three-terminal electrothermal device.
abstract: 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.
authors.affiliation: Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology , Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, United States.
authors.forename: Adam N
authors.initials: AN
authors.lastname: McCaughan
authors.forename: Karl K
authors.initials: KK
authors.lastname: Berggren
keywords: Superconductor; amplifier; cryotron; digital; logic; photon