Properties of Unshunted and Resistively Shunted Nb/AlOx-Al/Nb Josephson Junctions With Critical Current Densities From 0.1 to 1 mA/μm2

We investigated current-voltage characteristics of unshunted and externally shunted Josephson junctions (JJs) with high critical current densities J(c) in order to extract their basic parameters and statistical characteristics for JJ modeling in superconducting integrated circuits as well as to assess their potential for future technology nodes. Nb/AlOx-Al/Nb junctions with diameters from 0.5 to 6 mu m were fabricated using a fully planarized process with Mo or MoNx thin-film shunt resistors with sheet resistance R-sq = 2 Omega/sq and R-sq = 6 Omega/sq, respectively. We used our current standard MIT Lincoln Laboratory process node SFQ5ee to fabricate JJs with J(c) = 0.1 mA/mu m(2) and our new process node SFQ5hs (where hs stands for high speed) to make JJs with J(c) = 0.2 mA/mu m(2) and higher current densities up to about 1 mA/mu m(2). Using LRC resonance features on the I-V characteristics of shunted JJs, we extract the inductance associated with Mo shunt resistors of 1.4 pH/sq. The main part of this inductance, about 1.1 pH/sq, is the inductance of the 40-nm Mo resistor film, while the geometrical inductance of superconducting Nb wiring contributes the rest. We attribute this large inductance to kinetic inductance arising from the complex conductivity of a thin normal-metal film in an electromagnetic field with angular frequency omega, sigma(omega) = sigma(0)/(1 + i omega tau), where sigma(0) is the static conductivity and tau the electron scattering time. Using a resonance in a large-area unshunted high-J(c) junction excited by a resistively coupled small-area shunted JJ, we extract the Josephson plasma frequency and specific capacitance of high-J(c) junctions in 0.1-1 mA/mu m(2) J(c) range. We also present data on J(c) targeting and JJ critical current spreads. We discuss the potential of using 0.2-mA/mu m(2) JJs in very large scale integration single flux quantum circuits and 0.5-mA/mu m(2) JJs in high-density integrated circuits without shunt resistors.