Phase retrapping effects on switching characteristic in intrinsic Josephson junctions

Abstract

We report an experimental and theoretical analysis of the phase switch from the zero voltage state to the finite voltage state of Bi2Sr2CaCu2Oy intrinsic Josephson junctions (IJJs). In the resistively and capacitively shunted junction (RCSJ) model for a single Josephson junction, the effect of thermal fluctuations is taken into account as two stochastic processes: the thermally activated (TA) escape process from a potential well and the phase retrapping (PR) process to the next potential well. The two different methods examined here are (i) the so-called TA+PR model, which considers only successive PR processes after the TA escape process and (ii) the Monte Carlo simulations, which numerically simulate the sequence of stochastic processes. The fitting of the experimental data based on those two methods indicate that the complex stochastic processes missing in the TA+PR model are needed to explain the switching current distribution at relatively high temperatures. Furthermore, we propose the multi- RCSJ model taking into account a layered crystal structure of IJJs, and demonstrate the validity through a detailed fitting with experimental data.