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Temperature dependence of geometrical and velocity matching resonances in Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+x intrinsic Josephson junctions

We study temperature dependence of geometrical (Fiske) and velocity-matching (Eck) resonances in the flux flow state of small Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+x mesa structures. It is shown that the quality factor of resonances is high at low T, but rapidly decreases with increasing temperature already at T > 10 K. We also study T-dependencies of resonant voltages and the speed of electromagnetic waves (the Swihart velocity). Surprisingly it is observed that the Swihart velocity exhibits a flat T-dependence at low T, following T-dependence of the c-axis critical current, rather than the expected linear T-dependence of the London penetration depth. Our data indicate that self-heating is detrimental for operation of mesas as coherent THz oscillators because it limits the emission power via suppression of the quality factor. On the other hand, significant temperature dependence of the Swihart velocity allows broad-range tunability of the output frequency.