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arXiv:1111.0588 · Optics Express

Gated mode superconducting nanowire single photon detectors

Mohsen K. Akhlaghi, A. Hamed Majedi

Published Jan 10, 2012• 21 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Single Photon Detectors are fundamental to quantum optics and quantum information. Superconducting nanowire detectors exhibit high performance in free-running mode, but have a limited maximum count rate. By exploiting a bistable superconducting nanowire system, we demonstrate the first gated-mode operation of these detectors for a large active area single element device at 625MHz, one order of magnitude faster than its free-running counterpart. We show the maximum count rate in gated-mode operation can be pushed to GHz range without a compromise on the active area or quantum efficiency, while reducing the dark count rate.

DOI
10.1364/oe.20.001608

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Single Photon Detectors are fundamental to quantum optics and quantum information. Superconducting nanowire detectors exhibit high performance in free-running mode, but have a limited maximum count rate. By exploiting a bistable superconducting nanowire system, we demonstrate the first gated-mode operation of these detectors for a large active area single element device at 625MHz, one order of magnitude faster than its free-running counterpart. We show the maximum count rate in gated-mode operation can be pushed to GHz range without a compromise on the active area or quantum efficiency, while reducing the dark count rate.
Superconducting nanowire single photon detectors are a key technology for quantum information and science due to their high efficiency, low timing jitter, and low dark counts. In this work, we present a detector for single 1550 nm photons with up to 78% detection efficiency, timing jitter below 50 ps FWHM, 158 counts/s dark count rate - as well as a world-leading maximum count rate of 1.5 giga-counts/s at 3 dB compression. The PEACOQ detector (Performance-Enhanced Array for Counting Optical Quanta) comprises a linear array of 32 straight superconducting niobium nitride nanowires which span the mode of an optical fiber. This design supports high count rates with minimal penalties for detection efficiency and timing jitter. We show how these trade-offs can be mitigated by implementing independent read-out for each nanowire and by using a temporal walk correction technique to reduce count-rate dependent timing jitter. These detectors make quantum communication practical on a 10 GHz clock.
Superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors are a key technology for quantum information and science due to their high efficiency, low timing jitter, and low dark counts. In this work, we present a detector for single 1550 nm photons with up to 78% detection efficiency, timing jitter below 50 ps FWHM, 158 counts/s dark count rate, as well as a maximum count rate of 1.5 giga-counts/s at 3 dB compression. The PEACOQ detector (Performance-Enhanced Array for Counting Optical Quanta) comprises a linear array of 32 straight superconducting niobium nitride nanowires that span the mode of an optical fiber. This design supports high count rates with minimal penalties for detection efficiency and timing jitter. We show how these trade-offs can be mitigated by implementing independent readout for each nanowire and by using a temporal walk correction technique to reduce count-rate dependent timing jitter. These detectors make quantum communication practical on a 10 GHz clock.
High detection efficiency and low intrinsic dark count rate are two advantages of superconducting nanowire single photon detectors (SNSPDs). However, the stray photons penetrated into the fiber would cause the extrinsic dark count rate, owing to the free running mode of SNSPDs. In order to improve the performance of SNSPDs in realistic scenarios, stray photons should be investigated and suppression methods should be adopted. In this study, we demonstrate the pulse-gated mode, with 500 kHz gating frequency, of a commercial SNSPD system for suppressing the response of stray photons about three orders of magnitude than its free-running counterpart on the extreme test conditions. When we push the gating frequency to 8 MHz, the dark count rate still keeps under 4% of free-running mode. In experiments, the intrinsic dark count rate is also suppressed to 4.56 × 10−2 counts per second with system detection efficiency of 76.4372%. Furthermore, the time-correlated single-photon counting analysis also approves the validity of our mode in suppressing the responses of stray photons.
Superconducting Nanowire Single Photon Detectors (SNSPDs) excel at a wide variety of performance criteria for single photon counting. They combine unprecedented high detection efficiency, high timing resolution, high count rates, low intrinsic dark count rates, and are sensitive to ultraviolet through mid-infrared single-photons. At JPL, we are working on several projects to push the performance limits of SNSPDs to achieve higher maximum count rates, larger active areas, higher timing resolution, and a wider spectral range. Our recent advances enable new applications for dark matter detection, imaging, and space-to-ground communication and provide insight into the fundamental physics of single-photon detection in superconducting nanowires.
Superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors (SNSPDs) show near unity efficiency, low dark count rate, and short recovery time. Combining these characteristics with temporal control of SNSPDs broadens their applications as in active de-latching for higher dynamic range counting or temporal filtering for pump-probe spectroscopy or LiDAR. To that end, we demonstrate active gating of an SNSPD with a minimum off-to-on rise time of 2.4 ns and a total gate length of 5.0 ns. We show how the rise time depends on the inductance of the detector in combination with the control electronics. The gate window is demonstrated to be fully and freely, electrically tunable up to 500 ns at a repetition rate of 1.0 MHz, as well as ungated, free-running operation. Control electronics to generate the gating are mounted on the 2.3 K stage of a closed-cycle sorption cryostat, while the detector is operated on the cold stage at 0.8 K. We show that the efficiency and timing jitter of the detector is not altered during the on-time of the gating window. We exploit gated operation to demonstrate a method to increase in the photon counting dynamic range by a factor 11.2, as well as temporal filtering of a strong pump in an emulated pump-probe experiment.
Abstract A series superconducting nanowire single-photon detector is a high performance nanowire array detector that has the potential to reach a high system detection efficiency (SQE), a high counting rate (CR) and photon number resolving functionality. Interconnected with a simplified readout, it shows promise for large scale expansion and has good prospects for future applications in single-photon imaging, quantum optics, quantum computing and deep-space communication. In this paper, we demonstrate a high SQE and CR series superconducting nanowire single-photon detector with an active area of 20 × 20 μ m 2 . The detector shows a maximum SQE of 68% at 1550 nm with a dark count rate of 200 Hz and a wide response wavelength from 1100–2000 nm. It also achieves a CR over 300 MHz at single photon power level and has the capability of resolving photon numbers by up to six photons.