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Proceedings of SPIE, the International Society for Optical Engineering/Proceedings of SPIE

Improved photon-counting detector performance by intelligent management of detector deadtime

Sergey V. Polyakov, Alan L. Migdall, Ivo Pietro Degiovanni, Valentina Schettini

Published Sep 26, 2007• 1 citation
Publisher

Abstract

We discuss the difficulties of photon-counting at extremely high rates and introduce a scheme for a photon-counting detection system that addresses these difficulties. The method uses an array of N detectors and a 1-by-N optical switch with a control circuit to direct input light to live detectors. We compare performance of our system to other, passive detection systems and show that our detection system can handle incident photon rates higher than otherwise possible by suppressing the effects of detector deadtime. To support this claim, we present results of theoretical analysis and a proof-of- concept experiment. In particular, both calculations and the experiment prove that a group of intelligently managed N detectors provides an improvement in operation rate that can exceed the improvement that would be obtained by either a single detector with deadtime reduced by 1/N, even if it were feasible to produce a single detector with such a large improvement in deadtime, or a passive beamsplitter tree system with N detectors. In addition to deadtime reduction, our scheme reduces afterpulsing as well as background counts (such as dark counts). We conclude that an intelligent active management of a group of N detectors is the best arrangement of photon-counting detectors to handle high photon rates, an important technological challenge for fast developing quantum metrology and quantum key distribution applications.

DOI
10.1117/12.734055

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We discuss the difficulties of photon-counting at extremely high rates and introduce a scheme for a photon-counting detection system that addresses these difficulties. The method uses an array of N detectors and a 1-by-N optical switch with a control circuit to direct input light to live detectors. We compare performance of our system to other, passive detection systems and show that our detection system can handle incident photon rates higher than otherwise possible by suppressing the effects of detector deadtime. To support this claim, we present results of theoretical analysis and a proof-of- concept experiment. In particular, both calculations and the experiment prove that a group of intelligently managed N detectors provides an improvement in operation rate that can exceed the improvement that would be obtained by either a single detector with deadtime reduced by 1/N, even if it were feasible to produce a single detector with such a large improvement in deadtime, or a passive beamsplitter tree system with N detectors. In addition to deadtime reduction, our scheme reduces afterpulsing as well as background counts (such as dark counts). We conclude that an intelligent active management of a group of N detectors is the best arrangement of photon-counting detectors to handle high photon rates, an important technological challenge for fast developing quantum metrology and quantum key distribution applications.
We present a scheme for a photon-counting detection system that can be operated at incident photon rates higher than otherwise possible by suppressing the effects of detector deadtime. The method uses an array of N detectors and a 1-by-N optical switch with a control circuit to direct input light to live detectors. Our calculations and models highlight the advantages of the technique. In particular, using this scheme, a group of N detectors provides an improvement in operation rate that can exceed the improvement that would be obtained by a single detector with deadtime reduced by 1/N, even if it were feasible to produce a single detector with such a large improvement in deadtime. We model the system for continuous and pulsed light sources, both of which are important for quantum metrology and quantum key distribution applications.
We present a scheme for a photon-counting detection system that can be operated at incident photon rates higher than otherwise possible by suppressing the effects of detector deadtime. The method uses an array of N detectors and a 1-by-N optical switch with a control circuit to direct input light to live detectors. Our calculations and models highlight the advantages of the technique. In particular, using this scheme, a group of N detectors provides an improvement in operation rate that can exceed the improvement that would be obtained by a single detector with deadtime reduced by 1/N, even if it were feasible to produce a single detector with such a large improvement in deadtime. We model the system for continuous and pulsed light sources, both of which are important for quantum metrology and quantum key distribution applications.
As the quantum information field advances, the need for improved single-photon devices is becoming more critical. Quantum information systems are often limited by detector deadtime to count rates of a few MHz, at best. We present a multiplexed detection scheme that allows photon counting at higher rates than possible with single detectors. The system uses an array of detectors and an optical switch system to direct incoming photons to detectors known to be live. We model the system for realistic individual detector deadtimes and optical switching times. We show that such a system offers more promise than simply reducing the deadtime of an individual detector. We find that a system of N detectors with a given deadtime, can count photons at faster rates than a single detector with a deadtime reduced by 1/N, even if it were practical to make such a large improvement.
We present an actively multiplexed photon-counting detection system at telecom wavelengths that overcomes the difficulties of photon-counting at high rates. We find that for gated detectors, the heretofore unconsidered deadtime associated with the detector gate is a critical parameter, that limits the overall scalability of the scheme to just a few detectors. We propose and implement a new scheme that overcomes this problem and restores full scalability that allows an order of magnitude improvement with systems with as few as 4 detectors. When using just two multiplexed detectors, our experimental results show a 5x improvement over a single detector and a greater than 2x improvement over multiplexed schemes that do not consider gate deadtime.
This paper presents a simulation-based performance analysis of photon detection systems employing a multi-detector array and a timer-redirected single-photon detector under various operational conditions. The model incorporates practical parameters such as detector dead time, quantum efficiency, and dark count probability, with photon arrivals characterized by a Poisson process at a rate of 1 GHz. Two detection schemes are analyzed: (1) a parallel multi-detector array, which enables concurrent photon detection, and (2) a timer-redirected single-detector configuration, which utilizes a loop delay mechanism to recover photon events lost during dead time. To evaluate detection fidelity, the Quantum Bit Error Rate (QBER) is computed and compared across both models. Simulation results reveal that increasing the number of detectors in the array significantly reduces QBER; however, the timer-redirected single-detector model offers a costeffective alternative with notable performance improvements. These findings provide valuable insights for optimizing detector architectures in quantum communication systems and high-speed photon-counting applications.