The investigation of the switching-current probability distribution of a Josephson junction is a conventional tool to gain information on the dynamics of the phase slips as a function of the temperature. Here we adopt this well-established technique to probe the impact of an external static electric field on the occurrence of phase slips in gated all-metallic titanium (Ti) Josephson weak links. We show, in a temperature range between 20 and 420 mK, that the evolution of the dynamics of the phase slips as a function of the electrostatic field starkly differs from that observed as a function of the temperature. This fact demonstrates, on the one hand, that the electric field suppression of the critical current is not simply related to a conventional thermal-like quasiparticle overheating in the weak-link region. On the other hand, our results may open the way to operate an electrostatic-driven manipulation of phase slips in metallic Josephson nanojunctions, which can be pivotal for the control of decoherence in superconducting nanostructures.

• Received 28 November 2019
• Revised 27 February 2020
• Accepted 13 April 2020

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevApplied.13.054026