We study a model which can describe a superconducting single electron transistor (SSET) or a double quantum dot coupled to transmission-line oscillator. In both cases the degree of freedom is given by a charged particle, which couples strongly to the
electromagnetic environment or phonons. We consider the case where a lasing condition is established and study the dependence of the average photon number in the resonator on the spectral function of the electromagnetic environment. We focus on three important cases: a strongly coupled environment with a small cut-off frequency, a structured environment peaked at a specific frequency and 1/f-noise. We find that the electromagnetic environment can have a substantial impact on the photon creation. Resonance peaks are in general broadened and additional resonances can appear.
We propose a setup for a quantitative test of the quantum fluctuation theorem. It consists of a quantum conductor, driven by an external voltage source, and a classical inductor-capacitor circuit. The work done on the system by the voltage source can
be expressed by the classical degrees of freedom of the LC circuit, which are measurable by conventional techniques. In this way the circuit acts as a classical detector to perform measurements of the quantum conductor. We prove that this definition is consistent with the work fluctuation theorem. The system under consideration is effectively described by a Langevin equation with non-Gaussian white noise. Our analysis extends the proof of the fluctuation theorem to this situation.
We investigate qubit lasing in the strong coupling limit. The qubit is given by a Cooper-pair box, and population inversion is established by an additional third state, which can be addressed via quasiparticle tunneling. The coupling strength between
oscillator and qubit is assumed to be much higher than the quasiparticle tunneling rate. We find that the photon number distribution is sub-Poissonian in this strong coupling limit.
We study a superconducting single-electron transistor (SSET) which is coupled to a LC-oscillator via the phase difference across one of the Josephson junctions. This leads to a strongly anharmonic coupling between the SSET and the oscillator. The cou
pling can oscillate with the number of photons which makes this system very similar to the single-atom injection maser. However, the advantage of a design based on superconducting circuits is the strong coupling and existence of standard methods to measure the radiation field in the oscillator. This makes it possible to study many effects that have been predicted for the single-atom injection maser in a circuit quantum electrodynamics setup.
We study the photon generation in a transmission line oscillator coupled to a driven qubit in the presence of a dissipative electromagnetic environment. It has been demonstrated previously that a population inversion in the qubit may lead to a lasing
state of the oscillator. Here we show that the circuit can also exhibit the effect of lasing without inversion. This is possible since the coupling to the dissipative environment enhances photon emission as compared to absorption, similar to the recoil effect which was predicted for atomic systems. While the recoil effect is very weak, and so far elusive, the effect described here should be observable with present circuits. We analyze the requirements for the system parameters and environment.
A superconducting single-electron transistor (SSET) coupled to an anharmonic oscillator, e.g., a Josephson junction-L-C circuit, can drive the latter to a nonequilibrium photon number state. By biasing the SSET in a regime where the current is carrie
d by a combination of inelastic quasiparticle tunneling and coherent Cooper-pair tunneling (Josephson quasiparticle cycle), cooling of the oscillator as well as a laser like enhancement of the photon number can be achieved. Here we show, that the cut-off in the quasiparticle tunneling rate due to the superconducting gap, in combination with the anharmonicity of the oscillator, may create strongly squeezed photon number distributions. For low dissipation in the oscillator nearly pure Fock states can be produced.
