Comparison of dielectric loss in titanium nitride and aluminum superconducting resonators

Lossy dielectrics are a significant source of decoherence in superconducting quantum circuits. In this report, we model and compare the dielectric loss in bulk and interfacial dielectrics in titanium nitride (TiN) and aluminum (Al) superconducting coplanar waveguide resonators. We fabricate isotropically trenched resonators to produce a series of device geometries that accentuate a specific dielectric region's contribution to the resonator quality factor. While each dielectric region contributes significantly to loss in TiN devices, the metal-air interface dominates the loss in the Al devices. Furthermore, we evaluate the quality factor of each TiN resonator geometry with and without a post-process hydrofluoric etch and find that it reduced losses from the substrate-air interface, thereby improving the quality factor. (C) 2020 Author(s).