Results of capacitance ratio measurement for the single electron pump-capacitor charging experiment

Author

Zimmerman, N.M. ; Clark, A.F. ; Williams, E.R.

Author_Institution

Nat. Inst. of Stand. & Technol., Gaithersburg, MD, USA

fYear

1996

fDate

17-21 June 1996

Firstpage

505

Lastpage

506

Abstract

We report on a metrological application of the single electron tunneling (SET) phenomena: a precise measurement of the ratio of two cryogenic capacitors. Our measurement used a superconducting SET electrometer as the null detector for a capacitance bridge. We have achieved a 3-ppm level of imprecision in the measurement of capacitance ratio from 100 to 1000 Hz. We used custom-made cryogenic vacuum-gap capacitors, which have a leakage resistance of no less than 10/sup 19/ /spl Omega/. Further improvements can be made in the attempt to obtain an imprecision of 10/sup -8/ at lower frequencies, sufficient for the metrological measurement of capacitance or the fine-structure constant using an SET pump.

Keywords

capacitance measurement; capacitors; cryogenic electronics; measurement standards; superconducting junction devices; 100 to 1000 Hz; SET pump; capacitance bridge; capacitance ratio; capacitance ratio measurement; charging experiment; cryogenic capacitors; custom-made cryogenic vacuum-gap capacitors; fine-structure constant; leakage resistance; metrological application; null detector; single electron pump-capacitor; superconducting SET electrometer; Bridge circuits; Capacitance measurement; Capacitors; Cryogenics; Detectors; Electrical resistance measurement; Electrons; Temperature; Tunneling; Voltage;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Precision Electromagnetic Measurements Digest, 1996 Conference on

Conference_Location

Braunschweig, Germany

Print_ISBN

0-7803-3376-4

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/CPEM.1996.547319

Filename

547319