Phase-stable voltage bias for Josephson photonics devices
Abstract
Parametric interactions are foundational to superconducting quantum technologies, yet conventional microwave-driven pumping introduces parasitic Kerr nonlinearities and higher-order harmonics that limit device performance. Josephson Photonics (JP) avoids these parasitics by utilizing dc-biased junctions but has remained constrained by high phase noise and the absence of a stable phase reference. Here, we overcome this limitation by integrating a Josephson voltage standard (JVS) to establish a noise-tolerant phase reference, and demonstrate that this reference is coherently transferred to an inelastic Cooper-pair tunneling amplifier (ICTA) via the superconducting order parameter. The resulting low-phase-noise architecture yields a 14-dB enhancement in averaged gain and better quantum-limited noise performance. Critically, the phase reference enables the first observation of phase-sensitive gain and squeezing in a dc-biased amplifier. By reconciling clean, Kerr-free nonlinearities with phase-coherent drive, our architecture establishes a robust platform for high-purity parametric processes in superconducting circuits.
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BibTeX
@misc{esmaeili2026phasestable,
title = {{Phase-stable voltage bias for Josephson photonics devices}},
author = {Amir Hosein Esmaeili and Naveen Nehra and Alexandre Paquette and Mona Arabmohammadi and Baptiste Monge and Alexandre Rogalle and Francois Cyrenne-Bergeron and Yannick Lapointe and Nicolas Lavoie and Nicolas Bourlet and Max Hofheinz},
howpublished = {arXiv},
year = {2026},
month = sep,
doi = {10.48550/arxiv.2609.17165},
eprint = {2609.17165},
archivePrefix = {arXiv},
url = {https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.17165},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Phase-stable voltage bias for Josephson photonics devices
AU - Amir Hosein Esmaeili
AU - Naveen Nehra
AU - Alexandre Paquette
AU - Mona Arabmohammadi
AU - Baptiste Monge
AU - Alexandre Rogalle
AU - Francois Cyrenne-Bergeron
AU - Yannick Lapointe
AU - Nicolas Lavoie
AU - Nicolas Bourlet
AU - Max Hofheinz
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/09/16
PB - arXiv
DO - 10.48550/arxiv.2609.17165
UR - https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.17165
AB - Parametric interactions are foundational to superconducting quantum technologies, yet conventional microwave-driven pumping introduces parasitic Kerr nonlinearities and higher-order harmonics that limit device performance. Josephson Photonics (JP) avoids these parasitics by utilizing dc-biased junctions but has remained constrained by high phase noise and the absence of a stable phase reference. Here, we overcome this limitation by integrating a Josephson voltage standard (JVS) to establish a noise-tolerant phase reference, and demonstrate that this reference is coherently transferred to an inelastic Cooper-pair tunneling amplifier (ICTA) via the superconducting order parameter. The resulting low-phase-noise architecture yields a 14-dB enhancement in averaged gain and better quantum-limited noise performance. Critically, the phase reference enables the first observation of phase-sensitive gain and squeezing in a dc-biased amplifier. By reconciling clean, Kerr-free nonlinearities with phase-coherent drive, our architecture establishes a robust platform for high-purity parametric processes in superconducting circuits.
ER -