Superconducting nanowires connected in series for photon number resolving functionality

11th European Conference on Applied Superconductivity

Mattioli, F.^1 ; Jahanmirinejad, S.^2 ; Zhou, Z.^2 ; Gaggero, A.^1 ; Frucci, G.^2 ; Sahin, D.^2 ; Leoni, R.^1 ; Fiore, A.^2

Istituto di Fotonica e Nanotecnologie, CNR, Via Cineto Romano 42, Rome

00156, Italy^1

COBRA Research Institute, Eindhoven University of Technology, PO Box 513, Eindhoven

5600 MB, Netherlands^2

关键词: Experimental demonstrations;    Integrated resistors;    Photon absorptions;    Photon number resolving;    Photon number resolving detector;    Proof of principles;    Series connections;    Superconducting nanowire;   

Others  :  https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1742-6596/507/4/042024/pdf
DOI  :  10.1088/1742-6596/507/4/042024

来源: IOP

【 摘 要 】

The experimental demonstration of a superconducting photon-number-resolving detector, based on the series connection of N superconducting nanowires, is presented. An integrated resistor is connected in parallel to each section of the device that provides in this way a single voltage-readout, proportional to the number of photons detected in distinct nanowires. As a proof of principle a four element detector has been fabricated from an NbN film on a GaAs substrate and fully characterized. Clearly separated output levels corresponding to the detection of n 1-4 photons are observed achieving a single-photon system quantum efficiency of 2.6% at λ=1.3 μm. In order to demonstrate the potential scalability of the series-nanowire detector to a larger number of photons, we report our preliminary results in the characterization of detectors fabricated with 8 and 12 pixels. Clear evidence of n= 1-8 photon absorption in the 8-pixel detector has been achieved.