Inductance dependence of noise properties of a high-T_c dc superconducting quantum interference device

Properties of white noise of a high-T_c dc superconducting quantum interference device (SQUID) have been studied using numerical simulation. It is shown that thermal noise at T=77 K significantly affects the noise properties of the SQUID. As a result, dependencies of noise properties on inductance become quite different from conventional results at T=4.2 K. In contrast to the case T=4.2 K, the voltage noise of the SQUID at T=77 K depends very weakly on the inductance, while the transfer function degrades rapidly with inductance. Consequently, rapid degradation of flux noise with inductance, as compared with the case T=4.2 K, is caused mainly by that of the transfer function. These simulation results explain reasonably experimental results reported recently. Therefore, it is necessary to improve the transfer function for the improvement of noise properties in the case of large inductances. Numerical simulation shows that a method for improving the transfer function using resistively shunted inductance or three Josephson junctions, which was proposed by the authors, is also useful for improving noise properties in the case of large inductances.