Research Progress of Superconducting Transition-Edge Sensor Based Single-Photon Detector

Daiji Fukuda, Takahiro Kikuchi

Daiji Fukuda, Kazuki Niwa, Ryo Kobayashi +4 more

Gerrits, Calkins Calkins, Tomlin +4 more

Thomas Gerrits, Brice Calkins, Nathan A. Tomlin +4 more

Qingya Zhang, Dong Wen-Hui, He Gen-Fang +3 more

Over the past decade, there have been increasing demand on and interest in high performance single photon detectors in many new applications in quantum information technology. Compared with conventional single photon detectors, superconducting transition edge sensor (TES) based single photon detectors have great advantages in the performance of detection efficiency, energy resolution, photon number resolving capability, dark count rate, etc. They have been successfully used in quantum optics experiments and quantum key distribution systems, and they will play a more important role in the research field of quantum information science and technology. In this paper we review the operating principle, fabrication process, performance, measurement system and the research progress on superconducting TES based single photon detectors.

Nobuyuki Yoshikawa

Recent developments and their applications of superconducting detectors that directly detect the incidence of photons and particles will be reviewed. Transition-edge sensors, superconducting single-photon detectors and superconducting stripline sensors are included in this category. Their recent progresses in new application fields, such as quantum information communication and time-of-flight mass spectrometry, will be shown.