Records |
Author |
Ryabchun, Sergey; Tong, Cheuk-Yu Edward; Paine, Scott; Lobanov, Yury; Blundell, Raymond; Goltsman, Gregory |
Title |
Temperature resolution of an HEB receiver at 810 GHz |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2009 |
Publication |
IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond. |
Abbreviated Journal |
IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond. |
Volume |
19 |
Issue ![sorted by Issue field, descending order (down)](img/sort_desc.gif) |
3 |
Pages |
293-296 |
Keywords |
HEB mixer |
Abstract |
We present the results of direct measurements of the temperature resolution of an HEB receiver operating at 810 GHz, in both continuum and spectroscopic modes. In the continuum mode, the input of the receiver was switched between black bodies with different physical temperatures. With a system noise temperature of around 1100 K, the receiver was able to resolve loads which differed in temperature by about 1 K over an integration time of 5 seconds. This resolution is significantly worse than the value of 0.07 K given by the radiometer equation. In the spectroscopic mode, a gas cell filled with carbonyl sulphide (OCS) gas was used and the emission line at 813.3537060 GHz was measured using the receiver in conjunction with a digital spectrometer. From the observed spectra, we determined that the measurement uncertainty of the equivalent emission temperature was 2.8 K for an integration time of 0.25 seconds and a spectral resolution of 12 MHz, compared to a 1.4 K temperature resolution given by the radiometer equation. This relative improvement is due to the fact that at short integration times the contribution from 1/f noise and drift are less dominant. In both modes, the temperature resolution was improved by about 40% with the use of a feedback loop which adjusted the level of an injected microwave radiation to maintain a constant operating current of the HEB mixer. This stabilization scheme has proved to be very effective to keep the temperature resolution of the HEB receiver to close to the theoretical value given by the radiometer equation. |
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636 |
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Lobanov, Y.V.; Tong, C.-Y.E.; Hedden, A.S.; Blundell, R.; Voronov, B.M.; Gol'tsman, G.N. |
Title |
Direct measurement of the gain and noise bandwidths of HEB mixers |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2011 |
Publication |
IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond. |
Abbreviated Journal |
IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond. |
Volume |
21 |
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3 |
Pages |
645-648 |
Keywords |
waveguide NbN HEB mixers |
Abstract |
The intermediate frequency (IF) bandwidth of a hot electron bolometer (HEB) mixer is an important parameter of the mixer, in that it helps to determine its suitability for a given application. With the availability of wideband low noise amplifiers, it is simple to measure the performance of an HEB mixer over a wide range of IF at a fixed LO frequency using the standard Y-factor method. This in-situ method allows us to measure both the gain and noise bandwidths simultaneously. We have also measured mixer output impedance with a vector network analyser. Intrinsic time constant has been extracted from the impedance data and compared to the mixer's bandwidths determined from receiver Y-factor measurement. |
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RPLAB @ gujma @ |
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720 |
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Trifonov, A.; Tong, C.-Y. E.; Blundell, R.; Ryabchun, S.; Gol'tsman, G. |
Title |
Probing the stability of HEB mixers with microwave injection |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2015 |
Publication |
IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond. |
Abbreviated Journal |
IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond. |
Volume |
25 |
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3 |
Pages |
2300404 (1 to 4) |
Keywords |
NbN HEB mixer, stability, Allan-variance |
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Using a microwave probe as a tool, we have performed experiments aimed at understanding the origin of the output-power fluctuations in hot-electron-bolometer (HEB) mixers. We use a probe frequency of 1.5 GHz. The microwave probe picks up impedance changes of the HEB, which are examined upon demodulation of the reflected wave outside the cryostat. This study shows that the HEB mixer operates in two different regimes under a terahertz pump. At a low pumping level, strong pulse modulation is observed, as the device switches between the superconducting state and the normal state at a rate of a few megahertz. When pumped much harder, to approximate the low-noise mixer operating point, residual modulation can still be observed, showing that the HEB mixer is intrinsically unstable even in the resistive state. Based on these observations, we introduced a low-frequency termination to the HEB mixer. By terminating the device in a 50-Ω resistor in the megahertz frequency range, we have been able to improve the output-power Allan time of our HEB receiver by a factor of four to about 10 s for a detection bandwidth of 15 MHz, with a corresponding gain fluctuation of about 0.035%. |
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1051-8223 |
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1355 |
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Tong, C.-Y. E.; Trifonov, A.; Shurakov, A.; Blundell, R.; Gol’tsman, G. |
Title |
A microwave-operated hot-electron-bolometric power detector for terahertz radiation |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2015 |
Publication |
IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond. |
Abbreviated Journal |
IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond. |
Volume |
25 |
Issue ![sorted by Issue field, descending order (down)](img/sort_desc.gif) |
3 |
Pages |
2300604 (1 to 4) |
Keywords |
NbN HEB mixer |
Abstract |
A new class of microwave-operated THz power detectors based on the NbN hot-electron-bolometer (HEB) mixer is proposed. The injected microwave signal ( 1 GHz) serves the dual purpose of pumping the HEB element and enabling the read-out of the internal state of the device. A cryogenic amplifier amplifies the reflected microwave signal from the device and a homodyne scheme recovers the effects of the incident THz radiation. Two modes of operation have been identified, depending on the level of incident radiation. For weak signals, we use a chopper to chop the incident radiation against a black body reference and a lock-in amplifier to perform synchronous detection of the homodyne readout. The voltage measured is proportional to the incident power, and we estimate an optical noise equivalent power of 5pW/ √Hz at 0.83 THz. At higher signal levels, the homodyne circuit recovers the stream of steady relaxation oscillation pulses from the HEB device. The frequency of these pulses is in the MHz frequency range and bears a linear relationship with the incident THz radiation over an input power range of 15 dB. A digital frequency counter is used to measure THz power. The applicable power range is between 1 nW and 1 μW. |
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1558-2515 |
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1354 |
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Shurakov, A.; Tong, C.-Y. E.; Blundell, R.; Kaurova, N.; Voronov, B.; Gol'tsman, G. |
Title |
Microwave stabilization of a HEB mixer in a pulse-tube cryocooler |
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Journal Article |
Year |
2013 |
Publication |
IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond. |
Abbreviated Journal |
IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond. |
Volume |
23 |
Issue ![sorted by Issue field, descending order (down)](img/sort_desc.gif) |
3 |
Pages |
1501504-1501504 |
Keywords |
NbN HEB mixers |
Abstract |
We report the results of our study of the stability of an 800 GHz hot electron bolometer (HEB) mixer cooled with a pulse-tube cryocooler. Pulse-tube cryocoolers introduce temperature fluctuations as well as mechanical vibrations at a frequency of ~1 Hz, both of which can cause receiver gain fluctuations at that frequency. In our system, the motor of the cryocooler was separated from the cryostat to minimize mechanical vibrations, leaving thermal effects as the dominant source of the receiver gain fluctuations. We measured root mean square temperature variations of the 4 K stage of ~7 mK. The HEB mixer was pumped by a solid state local oscillator at 810 GHz. The root mean square current fluctuations at the low noise operating point (1.50 mV, 56.5 μA) were ~0.12 μA, and were predominantly due to thermal fluctuations. To stabilize the bias current, microwave radiation was injected to the HEB mixer. The injected power level was set by a proportional-integral-derivative controller, which completely compensates for the bias current oscillations induced by the pulse-tube cryocooler. Significant improvement in the Allan variance of the receiver output power was obtained, and an Allan time of 5 s was measured. |
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1051-8223 |
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1372 |
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