Trapping a single vortex and reducing quasiparticles in a superconducting resonator

TL;DR

This study demonstrates how trapping a single vortex in a superconducting resonator can either decrease or increase its quality factor depending on vortex position, with implications for quasiparticle management.

Contribution

It introduces a variable-linewidth resonator design to observe the effects of a single vortex on resonator performance and quasiparticle reduction.

Findings

A single vortex near a current antinode decreases quality factor.

A vortex at a current node increases quality factor.

Vortex trapping reduces nonequilibrium quasiparticles.

Abstract

Vortices trapped in thin-film superconducting microwave resonators can have a significant influence on the resonator performance. Using a variable-linewidth geometry for a weakly coupled resonator we are able to observe the effects of a single vortex trapped in the resonator through field cooling. For resonant modes where the vortex is near a current antinode, the presence of even a single vortex leads to a measurable decrease in the quality factor and a dispersive shift of the resonant frequency. For modes with the vortex located at a current node, the presence of the vortex results in no detectable excess loss and, in fact, produces an increase in the quality factor. We attribute this enhancement to a reduction in the density of nonequilibrium quasiparticles in the resonator due to the suppressed gap from the vortex.