Thermal signatures of Little-Parks effect in the heat capacity of mesoscopic superconducting rings

We present the first measurements of thermal signatures of the Little-Parks effect using a highly sensitive nanocalorimeter. Small variations of the heat capacity $C_p$ of 2.5 millions of non interacting micrometer-sized superconducting rings threaded by a magnetic flux $Phi$ have been measured by attojoule calorimetry. This non-invasive method allows the measurement of thermodynamic properties -- and hence the probing of the energy levels -- of nanosystems without perturbing them electrically. It is observed that $C_p$ is strongly influenced by the fluxoid quantization (Little-Parks effect) near the critical temperature $T_c$. The jump of $C_p$ at the superconducting phase transition is an oscillating function of $Phi$ with a period $Phi_0=h/2e$, the magnetic flux quantum, which is in agreement with the Ginzburg-Landau theory of superconductivity.