An attenuator or a dissipating element

Abstract

An attenuator arranged to thermalize radio frequency components, or a dissipating element arranged to thermalize lower frequency components than the radio frequency components, comprising: at least a first heat sink and a second heat sink; and at least one tunnel junction coupled to the first heat sink and the second heat sink, wherein the first heat sink and the second heat sink are capacitively grounded and arranged to provide heat dissipation via electron-phonon coupling; and wherein a combined resistance of the at least one tunnel junction and a heat sink coupled to it is below h e 2 , and/or a total capacitance of the first heat sink is above e 2 2 ⁢ k b ⁢ T and a total capacitance of the second heat sink is above e 2 2 ⁢ k b ⁢ T , wherein h is the Planck constant, e is the elementary charge, kb is the Boltzmann constant and T is the minimum temperature, where the attenuator or the dissipating element is arranged to be used.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.