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IEEE Transactions on Applied Superconductivity

Effect of the Wire Width and Magnetic Field on the Intrinsic Detection Efficiency of Superconducting Nanowire Single-Photon Detectors

R. Lusche, Alexej D. Semenov, K. Ilin, Y. Korneeva, Andrey Trifonov, Alexander A. Korneev, Heinz‐Wilhelm Hübers, M. Siegel, Gregory N Gol'tsman

Published Dec 20, 2012• 16 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We present thorough measurements of the intrinsic detection efficiency in the wavelength range from 350 to 2500 nm for meander-type TaN and NbN superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors with different widths of the nanowire. The width varied from 70 nm to 130 nm. The open-beam configuration allowed us to accurately normalize measured spectra and to extract the intrinsic detection efficiency. For detectors from both materials the intrinsic detection efficiency at short wavelengths amounts at 100% and gradually decreases at wavelengths larger than the specific cut-off wavelengths, which decreases with the width of the nanowire. Furthermore, we show that applying weak magnetic fields perpendicular to the meander plane decreases the smallest detectable photon flux.

DOI
10.1109/tasc.2012.2235515

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We present thorough measurements of the intrinsic detection efficiency in the wavelength range from 350 to 2500 nm for meander-type TaN and NbN superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors with different widths of the nanowire. The width varied from 70 nm to 130 nm. The open-beam configuration allowed us to accurately normalize measured spectra and to extract the intrinsic detection efficiency. For detectors from both materials the intrinsic detection efficiency at short wavelengths amounts at 100% and gradually decreases at wavelengths larger than the specific cut-off wavelengths, which decreases with the width of the nanowire. Furthermore, we show that applying weak magnetic fields perpendicular to the meander plane decreases the smallest detectable photon flux.
A thorough spectral study of the intrinsic single-photon detection efficiency in superconducting TaN and NbN nanowires with different widths has been performed. The experiment shows that the cut-off of the intrinsic detection efficiency at near-infrared wavelengths is most likely controlled by the local suppression of the barrier for vortex nucleation around the absorption site. Beyond the cut-off quasi-particle diffusion in combination with spontaneous, thermally activated vortex crossing explains the detection process. For both materials, the reciprocal cut-off wavelength scales linearly with the wire width where the scaling factor agrees with the hot-spot detection model.
We evaluate experimentally the intrinsic detection efficiency (IDE) of superconducting NbN nanowire single-photon detectors in the range of wire thicknesses from 4 to 12 nm. The study is performed in the broad spectral interval between near-ultraviolet (wavelength 400 nm) and near-infrared (wavelength 2000 nm) light with plane waves at normal incidence. For visible light the IDE of the thinnest detectors reaches 70%. We use numerically computed absorptance of the nanowire-structures for the analysis of the experimental data. Variations in the detection efficiency with both the wire thickness and the wavelength evidence the red boundary of the hot-spot photon-detection mechanism. We explain the detection at larger wavelengths invoking thermal excitation of magnetic Pearl vortices over the potential barrier at the edges of the wire.
We investigate the detection efficiency of a spiral layout of a superconducting nanowire single-photon detector. The design is less susceptible to the critical current reduction in sharp turns of the nanowire than the conventional meander design. Detector samples with different nanowire widths from 100 to 300 nm are patterned from a 4-nm-thick NbN film deposited on sapphire substrates. The critical current ICat 4.2 K for spiral, meander, and single-bridge structures is measured and compared. On the 100-nm-wide samples, the detection efficiency is measured in the wavelength range 400-1700 nm and the spectral bandwidth of the intrinsic detection efficiency is determined. In the optical range, the spiral detector reaches a detection efficiency of 27.6%, which is ~ 1.5 times the value of the meander. In the infrared range the detection efficiency of the spiral superconducting nanowire single-photon detector is more than doubled.
Superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors (SNSPDs) have attracted considerable attention owing to their excellent detection performance; however, the underlying physics of the detection process is still unclear. In this study, we investigate the wavelength dependence of the intrinsic detection efficiency (IDE) for NbN SNSPDs. We fabricate various NbN SNSPDs with linewidths ranging from 30 nm to 140 nm. Then, for each detector, the IDE curves as a function of bias current for different incident photon wavelengths of 510–1700 nm are obtained. From the IDE curves, the relations between photon energy and bias current at a certain IDE are extracted. The results exhibit clear nonlinear energy–current relations for the NbN detectors, indicating that a detection model only considering quasiparticle diffusion is unsuitable for the meander-type NbN-based SNSPDs. Our work provides additional experimental data on SNSPD detection mechanism and may serve as an interesting reference for further investigation.
We investigate the effect of varying both incoming optical wavelength and width of NbN nanowires on the superconducting single photon detectors (SSPD) detection efficiency. The SSPD are current biased close to critical value and temperature fixed at 4.2 K, far from transition. The experimental results are found to verify with a good accuracy predictions based on the “hot spot model,” whose size scales with the absorbed photon energy. With larger optical power inducing multiphoton detection regime, the same scaling law remains valid, up to the three-photon regime. We demonstrate the validity of applying a limited number of measurements and using such a simple model to reasonably predict any SSPD behavior among a collection of nanowire device widths at different photon wavelengths. These results set the basis for designing efficient single photon detectors operating in the infrared (2–5 μm range).
We present SNSPDs from NbN nanowires shaped after square-spiral, that allows an increase not only in critical currents, but also an extension of spectral detection efficiencies by just applying an external magnetic field. Using negative electron-beam lithography with the positive resist for shaping nanowires made it possible to reduce the inner bend radius. Consequently, the effect of critical-current enhancement in the magnetic field becomes stronger than it was demonstrated earlier. Here we achieved a 13% increase of the critical current in the magnetic field. We measured the spectra of the single-photon detection efficiency in the wavelength ranging from 400 to 1100 nm in the magnetic field. At zero field, the square-spiral has the spectrum similar to that of a meander. At the field providing the maximum of the critical current, the detection efficiency and the cutoff wavelength in the spectrum increase by 20% and by 54%, respectively. The magnetic-field dependence of the dark count rate is well described by the proposed analytical model.