Superconducting Quantum Interference based Electromechanical Systems

Mechanical sensors are essential tools for the detection of small forces. This thesis presents the dc SQUID as a detector for the displacement of embedded micromechanical resonators. The device geometry and basic operating principle are described. The SQUID displacement detector reaches an excellent resolution, a factor of 1.5 below the standard...

Superconducting flux qubits: Quantum chains and tunable qubits

This thesis presents results of theoretical and experimental work on superconducting persistent-current flux quantum bits. These qubits are promising candidates for the implementation of scalable quantum information processing. This work focuses on the study of one dimensional chains of inductively coupled flux qubits and on qubits with a...

Superconducting Quantum Circuits

This thesis describes a number of experiments with superconducting cir- cuits containing small Josephson junctions. The circuits are made out of aluminum islands which are interconnected with a very thin insulating alu- minum oxide layer. The connections form a Josephson junction. The current trough the junction is related to the superconducting...

Single electron and Cooper pair tunneling in circuits of small tunnel junctions