Resonance phenomena in macroscopic quantum tunneling: The small viscosity limit

We present a theoretical study of the resonant quantum behavior for a macroscopic superconducting system interacting with an external microwave at proper frequency. Here we consider a system described by a double well potential, an rf-SQUID, in the extremely underdamped regime. Numerical simulations for resonant phenomena have been performed for this system, whose parameters belong to the range typically used in the experiments. The dependence of the transition probability W on the external drive of the system, φx, can show three resonance peaks, in a small microwave frequency range. One peak is connected with the anticrossing and the other two with the external microwave frequency ν. The relative position and the height of the two lateral peaks depend on the microwave frequency. This behavior is studied here for the first time.