Magnetic field induced control of breather dynamics in a single plaquette of Josephson junctions

Abstract

We present a theoretical study of inhomogeneous dynamic (resistive) states in a single plaquette consisting of three Josephson junctions. Resonant interactions of such a breather state with electromagnetic oscillations manifest themselves by resonant current steps and voltage jumps in the current-voltage characteristics. An externally applied magnetic field leads to a variation of the relative shift between the Josephson current oscillations of two resistive junctions. By making use of the rotation wave approximation analysis and direct numerical simulations we show that this effect allows to effectively control the breather instabilities, e. g. to increase (decrease) the height of the resonant steps and to suppress the voltage jumps in the current-voltage characteristics.