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arXiv:1003.0525 · IEEE Transactions on Applied Superconductivity

Development of SNSPD System With Gifford-McMahon Cryocooler

Shigehito Miki, Mikio Fujiwara, Masahide Sasaki, Zhen Wang

Published Jun 1, 2009• 30 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

A superconducting nanowire single photon detector (SNSPD) system for telecommunication wavelength using a GM cryocooler was developed and its performance was verified. The cryocooler based SNSPD system can operate continuously with a 100 V AC power supply without any cryogen. The packaged SNSPD device was cooled to 2.96 K within a thermal fluctuation range of 10 mK. An SNSPD with an area of 20 times 20 mum2showed good system detection efficiency (DE) at 100 Hz dark count rate of 2.6% and 4.5% at wavelengths of 1550 and 1310 nm, respectively. An SNSPD with an area of 10 times 10 mum2and kinetic inductance lower than that of the large area device showed good system DE of 2.6% at a wavelength of 1550 nm. The SNSPD system could be operated for over 10 h with constant system DE and dark count rate.

DOI
10.1109/tasc.2009.2019027

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A superconducting nanowire single photon detector (SNSPD) system for telecommunication wavelength using a GM cryocooler was developed and its performance was verified. The cryocooler based SNSPD system can operate continuously with a 100 V AC power supply without any cryogen. The packaged SNSPD device was cooled to 2.96 K within a thermal fluctuation range of 10 mK. An SNSPD with an area of 20 times 20 mum2showed good system detection efficiency (DE) at 100 Hz dark count rate of 2.6% and 4.5% at wavelengths of 1550 and 1310 nm, respectively. An SNSPD with an area of 10 times 10 mum2and kinetic inductance lower than that of the large area device showed good system DE of 2.6% at a wavelength of 1550 nm. The SNSPD system could be operated for over 10 h with constant system DE and dark count rate.
We have developed a practical superconducting nanowire single photon detector (SNSPD) system with our superconducting thin films and devices fabrication, optical coupling packaging, and cryogenic technology. The SNSPD devices were fabricated from high-quality niobium nitride (NbN) ultra-thin films that were epitaxially grown on single-crystal MgO substrates, and optical cavity structure were applied for improvement of photo absorption efficiency. The SNSPD system was developed based on a compact Gifford-McMahon (GM) cryocooler, in which SNSPD can operate continuously at temperature of 2.9 K +/- 10 mK with low power consumption without any liquid cryogens. The system detection efficiencies at 1550 nm wavelength (at a 100 Hz dark count rate) were found to be 2.6% for device without optical cavity and 21% for device with optical cavity. The response speed of devices showed maximally 200 MHz with 5 × 5 mm square device, and timing jitter of 100 ps full width at a half maximum (FWHM) was observed.
Superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors (SNSPDs or SSPD) are highly promising devices in the growing field of quantum information and communications technology. We have developed a practical SSPD system with our superconducting thin films and devices fabrication, optical coupling packaging, and cryogenic technology. The SSPD system consists of six-channel SSPD devices and a compact Gifford-McMahon (GM) cryocooler, and can operate continuously on 100 V ac power without the need for any cryogens. The SSPD devices were fabricated from high-quality niobium nitride (NbN) ultrathin films that were epitaxially grown on single-crystal MgO substrates. The packaged SSPD devices were temperature stabilized to 2.96 K ± 10 mK. The system detection efficiency for an SSPD device with an area of 20 × 20 ¿m2was found to be 2.6% and 4.5% at wavelengths of 1550 and 1310 nm, respectively, at a dark count rate of 100 Hz, and a jitter of 100 ps full-width at half maximum. We also performed ultrafast BB84 quantum key distribution (QKD) field testing and entanglement-based QKD experiments using these SSPD devices.
We demonstrate superconducting nanowire single photon detector (SNSPD) for the wavelength at around 2 μm. The linewidth of the NbN nanowire is squeezed to 56 nm to increase the intrinsic response efficiencies at longer wavelengths such as 2 μm. Serially connecting avalanche architecture is applied to increase the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the response signal. Further, the optical cavity is optimized to improve the absorption of the device. A silica single-mode fiber is adopted to introduce photons to the SNSPD at a temperature of 2.25 K using a Gifford-McMahon cryocooler. The SNSPD exhibits detection efficiencies of 58%, 67%, and 63% at wavelengths of 1550, 1700, and 2000 nm, respectively, with dark count rate of ~12 kcps, which is reduced to 2 cps when the attached fiber pigtail is all placed inside the 40-K cryostat. The detection efficiency at 2000 nm is 2.5 times greater than that of the best previously developed detector with an efficiency of 25%. Our SNSPD is promising for practical applications in molecular science and earth meteorology.
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Shortly after their inception, superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors (SNSPDs) became the leading quantum light detection technology. With the capability of detecting single-photons with near-unity efficiency, high time resolution, low dark count rate, and fast recovery time, SNSPDs outperform conventional single-photon detection techniques. However, detecting lower energy single-photons (<0.8 eV) with high efficiency and low timing jitter has remained a challenge. To achieve unity internal efficiency at mid-infrared wavelengths, previous works used amorphous superconducting materials with low energy gaps at the expense of reduced time resolution (close to a nanosecond), and by operating them in complex mK dilution refrigerators. In this work, we provide an alternative approach with SNSPDs fabricated from 5-9.5 nm thick NbTiN superconducting films and devices operated in conventional Gifford-McMahon (GM) cryocoolers. By optimizing the superconducting film deposition process, film thickness and nanowire design, our fiber-coupled devices achieved > 70% system detection efficiency (SDE) at 2 μm and sub-15 ps timing jitter. Furthermore, detectors from the same batch demonstrated unity internal detection efficiency at 3 μm and 80% internal efficiency at 4 μm, paving the road for an efficient mid-infrared single-photon detection technology with unparalleled time resolution and without mK cooling requirements.