Observation of Interface Piezoelectricity in Superconducting Devices on Silicon

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Zhou, Haoxin, Li, Eric, Godeneli, Kadircan, Zhang, Zi-Huai, Jahanbani, Shahin, Yu, Kangdi, Odeh, Mutasem, Aloni, Shaul, Griffin, Sinéad, Sipahigil, Alp
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
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author Zhou, Haoxin
Li, Eric
Godeneli, Kadircan
Zhang, Zi-Huai
Jahanbani, Shahin
Yu, Kangdi
Odeh, Mutasem
Aloni, Shaul
Griffin, Sinéad
Sipahigil, Alp
author_facet Zhou, Haoxin
Li, Eric
Godeneli, Kadircan
Zhang, Zi-Huai
Jahanbani, Shahin
Yu, Kangdi
Odeh, Mutasem
Aloni, Shaul
Griffin, Sinéad
Sipahigil, Alp
contents The evolution of superconducting quantum processors is driven by the need to reduce errors and scale for fault-tolerant computation. Reducing physical qubit error rates requires further advances in the microscopic modeling and control of decoherence mechanisms in superconducting qubits. Piezoelectric interactions contribute to decoherence by mediating energy exchange between microwave photons and acoustic phonons. Centrosymmetric materials like silicon and sapphire do not display piezoelectricity and are the preferred substrates for superconducting qubits. However, the broken centrosymmetry at material interfaces may lead to piezoelectric losses in qubits. While this loss mechanism was predicted two decades ago, interface piezoelectricity has not been experimentally observed in superconducting devices. Here, we report the observation of interface piezoelectricity at an aluminum-silicon junction and show that it constitutes an important loss channel for superconducting devices. We fabricate aluminum interdigital surface acoustic wave transducers on silicon and demonstrate piezoelectric transduction from room temperature to millikelvin temperatures. We find an effective electromechanical coupling factor of $K^2\approx 2 \times 10^{-5}\%$ comparable to weakly piezoelectric substrates. We model the impact of the measured interface piezoelectric response on superconducting qubits and find that the piezoelectric surface loss channel limits qubit quality factors to $Q\sim10^4-10^8$ for designs with different surface participation ratios and electromechanical mode matching. These results identify electromechanical surface losses as a significant dissipation channel for superconducting qubits, and show the need for heterostructure and phononic engineering to minimize errors in next-generation superconducting qubits.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2409_10626
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Observation of Interface Piezoelectricity in Superconducting Devices on Silicon
Zhou, Haoxin
Li, Eric
Godeneli, Kadircan
Zhang, Zi-Huai
Jahanbani, Shahin
Yu, Kangdi
Odeh, Mutasem
Aloni, Shaul
Griffin, Sinéad
Sipahigil, Alp
Quantum Physics
Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics
Applied Physics
The evolution of superconducting quantum processors is driven by the need to reduce errors and scale for fault-tolerant computation. Reducing physical qubit error rates requires further advances in the microscopic modeling and control of decoherence mechanisms in superconducting qubits. Piezoelectric interactions contribute to decoherence by mediating energy exchange between microwave photons and acoustic phonons. Centrosymmetric materials like silicon and sapphire do not display piezoelectricity and are the preferred substrates for superconducting qubits. However, the broken centrosymmetry at material interfaces may lead to piezoelectric losses in qubits. While this loss mechanism was predicted two decades ago, interface piezoelectricity has not been experimentally observed in superconducting devices. Here, we report the observation of interface piezoelectricity at an aluminum-silicon junction and show that it constitutes an important loss channel for superconducting devices. We fabricate aluminum interdigital surface acoustic wave transducers on silicon and demonstrate piezoelectric transduction from room temperature to millikelvin temperatures. We find an effective electromechanical coupling factor of $K^2\approx 2 \times 10^{-5}\%$ comparable to weakly piezoelectric substrates. We model the impact of the measured interface piezoelectric response on superconducting qubits and find that the piezoelectric surface loss channel limits qubit quality factors to $Q\sim10^4-10^8$ for designs with different surface participation ratios and electromechanical mode matching. These results identify electromechanical surface losses as a significant dissipation channel for superconducting qubits, and show the need for heterostructure and phononic engineering to minimize errors in next-generation superconducting qubits.
title Observation of Interface Piezoelectricity in Superconducting Devices on Silicon
topic Quantum Physics
Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics
Applied Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2409.10626