| The radio-frequency single-electron transistor (RF-SET) [1--3] has attracted significant interest as one of the fastest charge detectors known today. In this thesis, we show that by designing an on-chip superconducting LC matching network for the RF-SET, we can minimize unwanted dissipation and optimize impedance matching. Using such a network, we fabricated one of world's fastest RF-SETs and measured the quantum noise of an S-SET near the quantum limit [4].;In the later part, we develop a design consisting of an SET embedded in a circuit quantum electrodynamics (QED) architecture, where the SET is coupled to a coplanar waveguide (CPW) resonator. The resonator is carefully designed to allow introduction of a DC voltage or current bias to the microwave cavity without significantly disturbing the cavity modes or degrading the quality factor [5]. Our proposed experiments will be focused on the zero bias region of the SET where it is strongly nonlinear. |
