A New, Minuscule SQUID to Detect Faint Magnetic Fields

(University of Basel, September 07, 2020)

A team led by University of Basel Professor Christian Schönenberger recently succeeded in creating one of the smallest superconducting quantum interference devices, or SQUIDs, ever built, which is able to measure extremely faint magnetic fields. Unlike conventional SQUIDs, which consist of a superconducting ring interrupted at two points by weak links, this new SQUID is made up of a stack of two-dimensional materials, including two graphene layers separated by a thin film of boron nitride, and as a result, has a “very small surface area, limited only by the constraints of nanofabrication technology,” as explained by Paritosh Karnatak. Although the researchers’ primary goal in developing the novel SQUIDs was to analyze the edge currents of topological insulators, instruments like this have a wide array of applications in applied fields, such as medicine, as well as in basic research.