Quasiparticle dynamics in granular aluminum close to the superconductor to insulator transition

Abstract

Superconducting high kinetic inductance elements constitute a valuable resource for quantum circuit design and millimeter-wave detection. Granular aluminum (GrAl) in the superconducting regime is a particularly interesting material since it has already shown a kinetic inductance in the range of nH$/\Box$ and its deposition is compatible with conventional Al/AlOx/Al Josephson junction fabrication. We characterize microwave resonators fabricated from GrAl with a room temperature resistivity of $4 \times 10^3\,\mu\Omega\cdot$cm, which is a factor of 3 below the superconductor to insulator transition, showing a kinetic inductance fraction close to unity. The measured internal quality factors are on the order of $Q_{\mathrm{i}} = 10^5$ in the single photon regime, and we demonstrate that non-equilibrium quasiparticles (QP) constitute the dominant loss mechanism. We extract QP relaxation times in the range of 1 s and we observe QP bursts every $\sim 20$ s. The current level of coherence of GrAl resonators makes them attractive for integration in quantum devices, while it also evidences the need to reduce the density of non-equilibrium QPs.