Superconducting Higgs Mode Metamaterials*

In this work, we investigate the possibility of using metamaterials to couple to the Higgs amplitude mode in an optimally doped thin film cuprate superconductor, YBa₂Cu₃O_7-d (YBCO). To coherently drive the condensate amplitude, we employ table top high-field terahertz radiation coupled with field enhancement metamaterials (that also serve as a bandpass filter). We utilize a metamaterial “tape” design that allows us to adhere the subwavelength resonators to the YBCO film without the need for photolithography. We will describe the design of the metamaterial tapes and present our preliminary experimental results using these tapes to access non-equilibrium order parameter dynamics in superconductors.