Flux-driven Josephson parametric amplifier

We have developed a Josephson parametric amplifier comprising a superconducting coplanar-waveguide resonator terminated by a dc superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID). An external field (the pump, similar to 20 GHz) modulates the flux threading of the dc SQUID and, therefore, the resonant frequency of the cavity field (the signal, similar to 10 GHz), which leads to the parametric signal amplification. We operated the amplifier at different band centers and observed amplification (17 dB at maximum) and deamplification depending on the relative phase between the pump and the signal. The noise temperature is estimated to be less than 0.87 K. (C) 2008 American Institute of Physics.