Rabi Flopping and Coherent Transients in a Josephson Junction

Abstract

Recently, studies involving coherent transient phenomena in Josephson devices have been discussed from a quantum optical perspective [1,2]. The motivation for these investigations has been the close analogy between two-level quantum optical systems and Josephson devices [3]. In particular, the angular momentum formulation of an n-atom system according to Dicke [4] has a close analogy to the corresponding problem of n-Cooper pairs interacting with the radiation field in a Josephson tunnel junction. In this article, we briefly review the fundamental concepts of superconductivity and superconducting tunnel junctions, and emphasize the relation between Josephson junctions and superradiant physics. We then sketch the analysis as applied to a tunnel junction undergoing dynamical transients first from a quantum optical and then from the common phenomenological point of view. We find that the present results differ from those obtained in the usual phenomenological fashion.