Hot electron heatsinks for microwave attenuators below 100 mK

Abstract

We demonstrate improvements to the cooling power of broad bandwidth (10 GHz) microwave attenuators designed for operation at temperatures below 100 mK. By interleaving 9-μm thick conducting copper heatsinks in between 10-μm long, 70-nm thick resistive nichrome elements, the electrical heat generated in the nichrome elements is conducted more readily into the heatsinks, effectively decreasing the thermal resistance between the hot electrons and cold phonons. For a 20 dB attenuator mounted at 20 mK, a minimum noise temperature of Tn ∼ 50 mK was obtained for small dissipated powers (Pd<1 nW) in the attenuator. For higher dissipated powers, we find Tn∝Pd1/4.4, with Pd=100 nW corresponding to a noise temperature of 90 mK. This is in good agreement with thermal modeling of the system and represents nearly a factor of 20 improvement in cooling power or a factor of 1.8 reduction in Tn for the same dissipated power, when compared to a previous design without interleaved heatsinks.

Document Details

Document Type
Pub Defense Publication
Publication Date
Apr 15, 2019
Source ID
10.1063/1.5097369

Entities

People

  • B. S. Palmer
  • F. C. Wellstood
  • Jay C LeFebvre
  • Jen-hao Yeh
  • Rui Zhang
  • Shavindra P Premaratne
  • Yizhou Huang

Organizations

  • Joint Quantum Institute
  • United States Department of Defense
  • University of Maryland

Tags

Fields of Study

  • Physics

Readers

  • Analytical Mechanics
  • Microwave Engineering.
  • Quantum Dot Semiconductor Device Photonics and Graphene Optoelectronic Materials and THz Physics.

Technology Areas

  • Microelectronics