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Quantum 2.0 Conference and Exhibition

Opto-Electronic Operation of an SNSPD with a Cryogenic Laser

Frederik Thiele, Niklas Lamberty, Thomas Hummel, Tim J. Bartley

Published Jan 1, 2024• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We demonstrate an opto-electronic operation of an SNSPD at 1K, utilizing a photodiode bias and a cryogenic laser for signal-readout. The cryogenic photonic link reduces the heatload and maintains a high performance of the SNSPD.
DOI
10.1364/quantum.2024.qth2c.5

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Superconducting Nanowire Single Photon Detectors (SNSPDs) have become an integral part of quantum optics in recent years because of their high performance in single photon detection. We present a method to replace the electrical input by supplying the required bias current via the photocurrent of a photodiode situated on the cold stage of the cryostat. Light is guided to the bias photodiode through an optical fiber, which enables a lower thermal conduction and galvanic isolation between room temperature and the cold stage. We show that an off-the-shelf InGaAs–InP photodiode exhibits a responsivity of at least 0.55 A/W at 0.8 K. Using this device to bias an SNSPD, we characterize the count rate dependent on the optical power incident on the photodiode. This configuration of the SNSPD and photodiode shows an expected plateau in the single photon count rate with an optical bias power on the photodiode above 6.8 µW. Furthermore, we compare the same detector under both optical and electrical bias, and show there is no significant changes in performance. This has the advantage of avoiding an electrical input cable, which reduces the latent heat load by a factor of 100 and, in principle, allows for low loss RF current supply at the cold stage.
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