Macroscopic quantum tunneling and thermal activation in a small mesa structured Bi2Sr2CaCu2Oy intrinsic Josephson junctions

Abstract

A nanometer-thick small mesa consiting of only two or three Bi2Sr2CaCu2Oy intrinsic Josephson junctions (IJJs) is studied through the switching current distribution measurements down to 0.4 K. Experimental results clearly show that the first switching events from the zero-voltage state for 1 K < T < 4 K are successfully described by a conventional thermal activation (TA) theory for a single Josephson junction, and that they become independent of temperature below T* ∼ 0.7 K. We observe the microwave-induced peak in the switching distribution at 0.4 K, which is induced by the microwave irradiation at 55 GHz. These results strongly suggest that the system crossovers to macroscopic quantum tunneling (MQT) regime below T*, which is as high as the previously reported value for a stacked IJJs with several tens of junctions, in contrast to the recent result on a similar mesa-structured surface IJJ.