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Asia-Pacific Microwave Conference (APMC)

A compact 500GHz SIS receiver system for POST

Qijun Yao, Xuesong Cao, Xu-Guo Zhang, Jing Li, Sheng‐Cai Shi, Ji Yang

Published Dec 1, 2009• 4 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We introduced here a compact 500 GHz SIS (superconductor-insulator-superconductor) heterodyne receiver system developed for POST (portable submillimeter telescope). The system is proved to have a small volume to be integrated with the small Dewar, which is cooled by a compact close-cycled 100 mW@ 4 K cryo-cooler. Test results shows that a good LO coupling and low signal loss is achieved with a less than 250 K overall receiver noise at 500 GHz waveband.

DOI
10.1109/apmc.2009.5384173

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We introduced here a compact 500 GHz SIS (superconductor-insulator-superconductor) heterodyne receiver system developed for POST (portable submillimeter telescope). The system is proved to have a small volume to be integrated with the small Dewar, which is cooled by a compact close-cycled 100 mW@ 4 K cryo-cooler. Test results shows that a good LO coupling and low signal loss is achieved with a less than 250 K overall receiver noise at 500 GHz waveband.
The submillimeter (submm) regime, ranging from 100 to 1000um, is an important frequency band for radio astronomy. A large number of astronomical spectral lines are located in this frequency region. Compared with ground-based observation, which is limited by the atmospheric absorption of signal, space borne platform provides perfect condition for submm observation. Here we introduce some preliminary results for a compact 500GHz SIS (Superconductor- Insulator-Superconductor) heterodyne receiver system developed for future space borne observation. Considering low power consumption requirement for space applications, we adopt a high critical temperature (Tc) NbN/AlN/NbN SIS tunnel junction for the mixer, a key component of the receiver system, which may work at relatively high temperature around 10 K. All the components, including the SIS mixer, HEMT low noise amplifier and optical lens, are assembled into a compact system. The whole system is cooled by a close-cycled 4K cryo-cooler in laboratory and test result shows a good noise performance, less than 250K at the 500GHz band. Detailed simulation and experimental results will be presented in this paper.
We have developed a 500-GHz superconducting SIS (superconductor-insulator-superconductor) receiver for the Portable Submillimeter Telescope (POST), which, with an aperture of 30 cm, is a submillimeter-wave telescope dedicated mainly to explore the large-scale distribution of neutral interstellar gas along the galactic plane. The 500-GHz SIS receiver is developed on the basis of the parallel-connected twin junction tuning circuitry and is designed to be compact and of low power consumption to fulfill the requirement of portability. Performance of the superconducting receiver system and results from astronomical observation was presented.
An engineering model has been built for a space-borne 640- GHz SIS receiver. It is the key component of Superconducting Submillimeter-Wave Limb-Emission Sounder, which is to be operated aboard the Japanese Experiment Module of the International Space Station in 2005. The receiver includes two Superconductor-Insulator-Superconductor (SIS) mixers cooled at 4.5 K, as well as four High-Electron-Mobility- Transistor (HEMT) amplifiers, two of which cooled at 20 K and the other two at 100 K. These components are integrated in a compact cryostat with two-stage Stirling and Joule- Thomson refrigerators. The receiver components has been successfully cooled and the cryostat has survived random vibration tests. The 640-GHz SIS mixer, which uses a pair of Nb/AlOx/Nb junctions connected in parallel, is built so that a broad RF matching be achieved without mechanical tuners. It is followed by cooled low noise HEMT amplifiers with a noise temperature of less than 17 K. The total receiver noise temperature has been measured around 180 - 220 K over the bandwidth of 5.5 GHz.
We report on research in the field of low-noise receiving systems in the sub-terahertz (THz) range, carried out in recent years, aimed at developing receivers with quantum sensitivity for implementation in space and ground-based radio telescopes. Superconductor-Insulator-Superconductor (SIS) mixers based on high-quality tunnel junctions are the key elements of the most sensitive sub-THz heterodyne receivers. Motivations and physical background for technology improvement and optimization, as well as fabrication details, are described. This article presents the results of the SIS receiver developments for the 211–275 GHz and 790–950 GHz frequency ranges with a noise temperature in the double sideband (DSB) mode of approximTELY 20 K and 200 K, respectively. These designs and achievements are implemented in the development of the receiving systems for the Russian Space Agency mission “Millimetron”, and for the ground-based APEX (Atacama Pathfinder EXperiment) telescope.
A 110 GHz superconductor insulator superconductor (SIS) tunnel junction receiver has been developed and used in regular astronomical observations on the 4m radio telescope at the Department of Astrophysics, Nagoya University. The SIS junction consists of a sandwich structure of Nb/AlOx/Nb, and is cooled to 4.2K with a closed cycle He-gas refrigerator. The receiver exhibits a best double side band noise temperature of 17±2 K at 110GHz. The receiver has a good response over this input frequency range of 98-115 GHz.
This repost describes our results on development of low-noise heterodyne THz receivers for ground based and space radio astronomy. Superconductor-insulator-superconductor (SIS) mixers that employ high quality Nb-based tunnel junctions are the key element of the most sensitive heterodyne THz receivers. In particular we present here the SIS receivers for frequency range 211-275 GHz and 800-950 GHz with double sideband (DSB) noise temperature of about 25 K and 220 K, respectively. The latest results on development, fabrication techniques and experimental study of the SIS receivers will be discussed.