Dale J. Van Harlingen
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
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Primary Section: 13, Physics Secondary Section: 33, Applied Physical Sciences Membership Type:
Member
(elected 2003)
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Research Interests
The theme of my research program is the use of microfabrication techniques and advanced experimental probes to study the fundamental properties of superconducting materials and superconductor electronic devices. The primary focus has been the exploration of quantum phenomena and phase dynamics in superconducting systems using SQUIDs (Superconducting QUantum Interference Devices), the world's most sensitive detectors of currents and magnetic fields. At the beginning of my career, the emphasis was on measurements of charge transport in nonequilibrium superconductors and magnetic vortex transport in superconductor arrays. For this work, we developed novel scanning probe instruments, in particular the Scanning SQUID Microscope that allows the imaging of vortex configurations and dynamics in superconductor systems. After the discovery of the high temperature superconductors, my group pioneered the phase-sensitive SQUID interferometry technique for determining the symmetry of the superconducting order parameter and verified the exotic d-wave symmetry, a discovery that launched a still-ongoing effort to understand the symmetry and mechanism of unconventional superconductors. Present interests include transport and fluctuations in high temperature superconductor nanowires, and quantum dynamics and sources of decoherence in superconductor devices and their application in quantum computing.
