Quasi-continuous dc voltage standard using sinusoidal and pulse-driven Josephson junction arrays

Abstract

Josephson voltage standards (JVSs) provide a primary realization of the volt, the unit of electromotive force. They generate direct current (dc) voltages up to 10 V and show agreement better than 1 nV V−1 at 10 V. For JVSs based on Josephson junction arrays (JJAs) that are driven by sinusoidal radiofrequency (RF) power, commonly referred to as continuous wave-driven JJAs (CWD JJAs), the minimum voltage that can be generated is limited to the voltage across one Josephson junction (JJ) for practical devices. To achieve this resolution, they may require a perfect JJA chip. JVSs based on a pulse-driven (PD) JJA require high performance electronics (i.e. high bandwidth, low distortion and jitter, pulse shaping filters and large memory) to achieve their minimum and maximum voltage. We have combined two CWD JJAs and two PD JJAs driven by two microwave inputs to one chip to generate quasi-continuous dc voltages up to the sum of the full-scale voltages of both JJAs that are robust to the imperfections of the JJs and have relaxed requirements on the RF electronics driving the JJA, compared to the existing CWD JVSs and PD JVSs, respectively. By use of the JJA chip at the National Measurement Institute Australia, we demonstrate its feasibility to generate voltages up to 1 V. Preliminary evaluation of the system shows that the voltage uncertainty can be 11 nV (k = 2) or better and the theoretical resolution is better than 1 nV from 0 V to 1 V. The main requirement is that all the JJs must have quantum locking ranges with respect to the power and frequency of the RF bias and for the PD JJAs to have a constant voltage over a range of dc bias current. Although this development is not a replacement for existing state-of-the-art JVSs, we anticipate that it will be an alternative fit-for-purpose solution for metrological applications under non-ideal operating conditions or when the components of the state-of-the-art solutions are not available.