Cooper pair tunnelling and quasiparticle poisoning in a galvanically isolated superconducting double dot

We increase the isolation of a superconducting double dot from its environment by galvanically isolating it from any electrodes. We probe it using high frequency reflectometry techniques, find 2e-periodic behaviour, and characterise the energy structure of its charge states. By modelling the response of the device, we determine the quasiparticle poisoning rate to be significantly worse than that of a unisolated double dot, and conclude that quasiparticle exchange between the dot and the leads is an important relaxation mechanism.