Transport Characteristics of Al/LAO/STO-LAO/STO Nanostructures*

The interface of LAO/STO supports a 2D electron gas that can be further reconfigured into nanostructures using conductive atomic force microscope lithography. As grown, LAO/STO has a critical thickness of 4 unit cells (u.c.) of LAO. By capping the surface of LAO/STO with Al, the critical thickness can be reduced from 4 u.c. to 1 u.c. Our aim is to create Al/LAO/STO nanostructures and couple to them using LAO/STO nanostructures, in order to reveal properties that might be associated with superconductivity in Al and at the at the LAO/STO interface. These devices also have the potential to be coupled to other Al-based, superconducting devices such as SQUIDs and superconducting microwave resonators.