Biography
My general interest is mesoscopic quantum physics. More specifically I want to understand the dynamics of mesoscopic systems such as diffusive Josephson junctions, carbon nanotube quantum dots or superconducting nanowires at microwave frequencies.
Interests
- Microwave photonic
- Quantum noise
- Mesoscopic superconductivity
- Nanoelectronics
Education
- PhD in Condensed Matter, 2011 Université Paris Sud
| Teaching activities I am teaching a wide range of topics ranging from classical mechanics to superconductivity passing through Nanofabrication in clean room facilities and quantum Hall effect measurements at low temperature. |
 | Quantum Hall effect in graphene – Master 2 This lab class consists in fabricating in a clean room environment Hall bars in CVD graphene. The graphene is then used as a two-dimensional electron gas that we cool down to 4.2K in liquid Helium. We then characterize its electrical properties with respect to magnetic field highlighting successively quantum effects that are Shubnikov-de Haas oscillations and the famous quantum Hall effect at high field (5 Teslas). This labclass combines very technical aspects with nanofabrication and low-temperature measurements together with an important theoretical input to understand magnetotransport in graphene (Landau quantization, Landauer-Buttiker formalism). This labclass is benefitting from the support of Labex LaSips, NanoSaclay and Palm. Contacts: Julien Basset Documents: Slides, Notes |
| Carbon nanotube transistors – Master 2 In this lab class we fabricate in a clean room environment carbon-nanotubes based transistors with optical lithography, e-gun evaporation and lift-off techniques. We then characterize the fabricated devices with scanning electron microscope imaging and room-temperature electrical measurements. Contacts: Julien Basset, Adel Bousseksou, Guillaume Agnus, Sylvia Matzen |  |
 | Superconductivity – Master 1 This practical is divided in two experiments. In a first set of experiment the students have to measure the superconducting transition of YBaCuO while measuring the resistance versus temperature. This is done with a computer-controlled acquisition card and a cold stage that cools down to 40K. The second experiment consists in using a SQUID (Superconducting QUantum Interference Device) to measure the Earth’s magnetic field and fields generated by common magnets. The SQUID experiment allows to introduce fundamental concepts that are the Josephson effect and the flux quantization. Contacts: Julien Basset, Francesca Chiodi, Odile Stephan, Edwin Kermarrec Documents: Handout |
 | Python Monte Carlo simulation of the 2D spin Ising model – Master 1 This numerical project realized with Python aims at emulating the magnetic phase transition that occurs in a two-dimensional array of classical spins at the Curie temperature. This is done by using a Monte Carlo algorithm and the goal is to extract critical exponents.. Contacts: Julien Basset, Edwin Kermarrec Documents: Handout |
| Waves – L2 Polytech In these exercice and lab classes, we treat fundamental concepts related to scalar waves. We start introducing definitions of propagating longitudinal waves and transversal waves to finally end with stationnary waves, eigen modes concepts and interferences. Throughout the lecture, we make use of microscopic models to derive d’Alembert’s wave equation for sound and wave on a string. We then use this equation to find and use dispersion relations of different propagating media. Contacts: Julien Basset, Pascal Simon Documents: Lecture, Exercises , LabClass |  |
 | Mechanics I – L1S1 We introduce fundamental concepts of classical mechanics such as forces, Newton’s laws, kinetic energy theorem, work, potential energy. Fundamental mathematics tools are used for the first time such as differential equations of the first and second kinds. This allows us to treat friction and oscillating behaviours. The exercise class system has evolved since few years with the introduction of “tutorials” as a new pedagogical tool. Contact: Julien Basset, Arne Keller Documents: Exercises , Lecture Notes |
| Mechanics II – L1S2 Starting from the basic knowledge of mechanics I we further introduce polar, cylindrical, spherical and intrinsic coordinates. We treat non-galilean referentials with the concept of inertial forces. Other fundamental tools such as kinetic momentum, force momentum and the kinetic momentum theorem are introduced. Finally the moment of inertia is treated to deal with extended objects. Contacts: Julien Basset, Miguel Monteverde Documents: Exercises |  https://www.youtube.com/embed/UYAB0HsXzrc |
 | Methodology – L1S2 In this lecture we introduce methods to solve simple physics problems for which one a priori has no clue about the answer. This lecture talks about Fermi questions, orders of magnitudes, error propagation… We also use this lecture to realize a mechanical pendulum with smartphones thanks to the application Phyphox. The experimental data are then treated numerically and compared to the theory. At the end of the lecture, the students present one of the major topics of the class in front of their colleagues as an exercise to communicate in front of a crowd. Contacts: Julien Basset, Emmanuelle Rio Documents: Handout |
| Free Physics projects – L3S2 The principle of these projects is to let the students conceive and build their own experiment using sensors and tools available in the student lab. The data acquisition is done using Arduino cards, a free and inexpensive technology. At the end the students can share their TP on the open TP platform. These projects promote autonomy and is close from the work of researchers in laboratories. Contacts: Julien Basset, Frederic Bouquet |  |
Single microwave photon detection using disordered superconductors
In recent years, high kinetic inductance superconducting materials (HKIM) have gained a lot of interest in quantum circuit technologies. Operated in the microwave frequency domain they allow to engineer high impedance circuits providing an efficient way to e.g. increase the coherence time of superconducting quantum bits or couple electron charge and spins to microwave photons. This research project proposes to extend the prominent role of high kinetic inductance superconducting materials in quantum technologies by building a high kinetic inductance-based single microwave photon detector. The detection principle will be based on the large coupling of a single tunnel junction to a microwave resonator enabled by the use of high kinetic inductance superconducting materials in the fabrication process. The developed material will consist in superconducting granular aluminum which is compatible with optical and e-beam lithography and has already shown attractive microwave properties. This situation allows to efficiently convert a microwave photon into a single charge with a quantum efficiency close to unity. The charge is then detected using standard electrometry techniques. Up-to-now, this type of device only exists for photons with frequencies in the optical domain. Extending such a fundamental quantum detector to the microwave domain will open many new possibilities in quantum optics and quantum information processing with microwave photons.
Dynamics and gating of fully metallic Josephson junctions
We study the reduction of the supercurrent by a gate electrode in a purely metallic superconductor–normal
metal–superconductor Josephson junction by performing, on the same device, a detailed investigation of the
gate-dependent switching probability together with the local tunneling spectroscopy of the normal metal. We
demonstrate that high energy electrons leaking from the gate trigger the reduction of the critical current
which is accompanied by an important broadening of the switching histograms. The switching rates are well
described by an activation formula including an additional term accounting for the injection of rare high energy
electrons from the gate. The rate of electrons obtained from the fit remarkably coincides with the independently
measured leakage current. Concomitantly, a negligible elevation of the local temperature in the junction is found
by tunneling spectroscopy which excludes stationary heating induced by the leakage current as a possible
explanation of the reduction of the critical current. This incompatibility is resolved by the fact that phase
dynamics and thermalization effects occur at different timescales.
https://journals.aps.org/prresearch/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevResearch.3.043169
Microwave photon emission in double quantum dot systems
We explore the microwave radiation emitted from a biased double quantum dot due to the inelastic tunneling of single charges. Radiation is detected over a broad range of detuning configurations between the dot energy levels, with pronounced maxima occurring in resonance with a capacitively coupled transmission line resonator. The power emitted for forward and reverse resonant detuning is found to be in good agreement with a rate equation model, which considers the hybridization of the individual dot charge states.
https://journals.aps.org/prl/abstract/10.1103/PhysRevLett.115.046802
Preprint(s)
Quantum bath engineering of a high impedance microwave mode through quasiparticle tunneling,
Gianluca Aiello, Mathieu Féchant, Alexis Morvan, Julien Basset, Marco Aprili, Julien Gabelli, Jérôme Estève,
Role of optical rectification in photon-assisted tunneling current
P. Février, J. Basset, J. Estève, M. Aprili, J. Gabelli
Publications
Contact
- julien.basset@universite-paris-saclay.fr
- +33 (0) 1 69 15 80 11
- bat 510, campus Univ. d’Orsay, Orsay, 91400
| 09/2014 – Today | University Lecturer at Université Paris Saclay |
| 11/2011 – 08/2014 | Joint Post-Doc between the Ensslin group and Wallraff group at ETH Zürich |
| 09/2008 – 10/2011 | PhD Thesis in the Hélène Bouchiat’s group at the laboratoire de physique des solides, Orsay (France): High frequency quantum noise of mesoscopic systems and current-phase relation of hybrid junctions |
| 03/2008 – 07/2008 | Master thesis in Maxim Tsoi lab at UT Austin (Texas-USA) |
| Teaching activities I am teaching a wide range of topics ranging from classical mechanics to superconductivity passing through Nanofabrication in clean room facilities and quantum Hall effect measurements at low temperature. |
 | Quantum Hall effect in graphene – Master 2 This lab class consists in fabricating in a clean room environment Hall bars in CVD graphene. The graphene is then used as a two-dimensional electron gas that we cool down to 4.2K in liquid Helium. We then characterize its electrical properties with respect to magnetic field highlighting successively quantum effects that are Shubnikov-de Haas oscillations and the famous quantum Hall effect at high field (5 Teslas). This labclass combines very technical aspects with nanofabrication and low-temperature measurements together with an important theoretical input to understand magnetotransport in graphene (Landau quantization, Landauer-Buttiker formalism). This labclass is benefitting from the support of Labex LaSips, NanoSaclay and Palm. Contacts: Julien Basset Documents: Slides , Notes |
| Carbon nanotube transistors – Master 2 In this lab class we fabricate in a clean room environment carbon-nanotubes based transistors with optical lithography, e-gun evaporation and lift-off techniques. We then characterize the fabricated devices with scanning electron microscope imaging and room-temperature electrical measurements. Contacts: Julien Basset, Adel Bousseksou, Guillaume Agnus, Sylvia Matzen |  |
 | Superconductivity – Master 1 This practical is divided in two experiments. In a first set of experiment the students have to measure the superconducting transition of YBaCuO while measuring the resistance versus temperature. This is done with a computer-controlled acquisition card and a cold stage that cools down to 40K. The second experiment consists in using a SQUID (Superconducting QUantum Interference Device) to measure the Earth’s magnetic field and fields generated by common magnets. The SQUID experiment allows to introduce fundamental concepts that are the Josephson effect and the flux quantization. Contacts: Julien Basset, Francesca Chiodi, Odile Stephan, Edwin Kermarrec Documents: Handout |
 | Python Monte Carlo simulation of the 2D spin Ising model – Master 1 This numerical project realized with Python aims at emulating the magnetic phase transition that occurs in a two-dimensional array of classical spins at the Curie temperature. This is done by using a Monte Carlo algorithm and the goal is to extract critical exponents.. Contacts: Julien Basset, Edwin Kermarrec Documents: Handout |
| Waves – L2 Polytech In these exercice and lab classes, we treat fundamental concepts related to scalar waves. We start introducing definitions of propagating longitudinal waves and transversal waves to finally end with stationnary waves, eigen modes concepts and interferences. Throughout the lecture, we make use of microscopic models to derive d’Alembert’s wave equation for sound and wave on a string. We then use this equation to find and use dispersion relations of different propagating media. Contacts: Julien Basset, Pascal Simon Documents: Exercises , LabClass |  |
 | Mechanics I – L1S1 We introduce fundamental concepts of classical mechanics such as forces, Newton’s laws, kinetic energy theorem, work, potential energy. Fundamental mathematics tools are used for the first time such as differential equations of the first and second kinds. This allows us to treat friction and oscillating behaviours. The exercise class system has evolved since few years with the introduction of “tutorials” as a new pedagogical tool. Contact: Julien Basset, Arne Keller Documents: Exercises , Lecture Notes |
| Mechanics II – L1S2 Starting from the basic knowledge of mechanics I we further introduce polar, cylindrical, spherical and intrinsic coordinates. We treat non-galilean referentials with the concept of inertial forces. Other fundamental tools such as kinetic momentum, force momentum and the kinetic momentum theorem are introduced. Finally the moment of inertia is treated to deal with extended objects. Contacts: Julien Basset, Miguel Monteverde Documents: Exercises , Phyphox Videos |  https://www.youtube.com/embed/UYAB0HsXzrc |
 | Methodology – L1S2 In this lecture we introduce methods to solve simple physics problems for which one a priori has no clue about the answer. This lecture talks about Fermi questions, orders of magnitudes, error propagation… We also use this lecture to realize a mechanical pendulum with smartphones thanks to the application Phyphox. The experimental data are then treated numerically and compared to the theory. At the end of the lecture, the students present one of the major topics of the class in front of their colleagues as an exercise to communicate in front of a crowd. Contacts: Julien Basset, Emmanuelle Rio Documents: Handout |
| Free Physics projects – L3S2 The principle of these projects is to let the students conceive and build their own experiment using sensors and tools available in the student lab. The data acquisition is done using Arduino cards, a free and inexpensive technology. At the end the students can share their TP on the open TP platform. These projects promote autonomy and is close from the work of researchers in laboratories. Contacts: Julien Basset, Frederic Bouquet |  |