Yang, Z. Q., Hajenius, M., Baselmans, J. J. A., Gao, J. R., Voronov, B., & Gol’tsman, G. N. (2006). Reduced noise in NbN hot-electron bolometer mixers by annealing. Supercond. Sci. Technol., 19(4), L (9 to 12).
Abstract: We find that the sensitivity of heterodyne receivers based on superconducting hot-electron bolometers (HEBs) increases by 25–30% after annealing at 85 °C in vacuum. The devices studied are twin-slot antenna coupled mixers with a small NbN bridge of 1 × 0.15 µm2. We show that annealing changes the device properties as reflected in sharper resistive transitions of the complete device, apparently reducing the device-related noise. The lowest receiver noise temperature of 700 K is measured at a local oscillator frequency of 1.63 THz and a bath temperature of 4.3 K.
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Krause, S., Mityashkin, V., Antipov, S., Gol’tsman, G., Meledin, D., Desmaris, V., et al. (2017). Reduction of phonon escape time for nbn hot electron bolometers by using gan buffer layers. IEEE Trans. Terahertz Sci. Technol., 7(1), 53–59.
Abstract: In this paper, we investigated the influence of the GaN buffer layer on the phonon escape time of phonon-cooled hot electron bolometers (HEBs) based on NbN material and compared our findings to conventionally employed Si substrate. The presented experimental setup and operation of the HEB close to the critical temperature of the NbN film allowed for the extraction of phonon escape time in a simplified manner. Two independent experiments were performed at GARD/Chalmers and MSPU on a similar experimental setup at frequencies of approximately 180 and 140 GHz, respectively, and have shown reproducible and consistent results. By fitting the normalized IF measurement data to the heat balance equations, the escape time as a fitting parameter has been deduced and amounts to 45 ps for the HEB based on Si substrate as in contrast to a significantly reduced escape time of 18 ps for the HEB utilizing the GaN buffer layer under the assumption that no additional electron diffusion has taken place. This study indicates a high phonon transmissivity of the NbN-to-GaN interface and a prospective increase of IF bandwidth for HEB made of NbN on GaN buffer layers, which is desirable for future THz HEB heterodyne receivers.
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Kardakova, A., Shishkin, A., Semenov, A., Goltsman, G. N., Ryabchun, S., Klapwijk, T. M., et al. (2016). Relaxation of the resistive superconducting state in boron-doped diamond films. Phys. Rev. B, 93(6), 064506.
Abstract: We report a study of the relaxation time of the restoration of the resistive superconducting state in single crystalline boron-doped diamond using amplitude-modulated absorption of (sub-)THz radiation (AMAR). The films grown on an insulating diamond substrate have a low carrier density of about 2.5×1021cm−3 and a critical temperature of about 2K. By changing the modulation frequency we find a high-frequency rolloff which we associate with the characteristic time of energy relaxation between the electron and the phonon systems or the relaxation time for nonequilibrium superconductivity. Our main result is that the electron-phonon scattering time varies clearly as T−2, over the accessible temperature range of 1.7 to 2.2 K. In addition, we find, upon approaching the critical temperature Tc, evidence for an increasing relaxation time on both sides of Tc.
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Bandurin, D. A., Svintsov, D., Gayduchenko, I., Xu, S. G., Principi, A., Moskotin, M., et al. (2018). Resonant terahertz detection using graphene plasmons. Nat. Commun., 9, 5392 (1 to 8).
Abstract: Plasmons, collective oscillations of electron systems, can efficiently couple light and electric current, and thus can be used to create sub-wavelength photodetectors, radiation mixers, and on-chip spectrometers. Despite considerable effort, it has proven challenging to implement plasmonic devices operating at terahertz frequencies. The material capable to meet this challenge is graphene as it supports long-lived electrically tunable plasmons. Here we demonstrate plasmon-assisted resonant detection of terahertz radiation by antenna-coupled graphene transistors that act as both plasmonic Fabry-Perot cavities and rectifying elements. By varying the plasmon velocity using gate voltage, we tune our detectors between multiple resonant modes and exploit this functionality to measure plasmon wavelength and lifetime in bilayer graphene as well as to probe collective modes in its moire minibands. Our devices offer a convenient tool for further plasmonic research that is often exceedingly difficult under non-ambient conditions (e.g. cryogenic temperatures) and promise a viable route for various photonic applications.
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Gayduchenko, I., Kardakova, A., Fedorov, G., Voronov, B., Finkel, M., Jiménez, D., et al. (2015). Response of asymmetric carbon nanotube network devices to sub-terahertz and terahertz radiation. J. Appl. Phys., 118(19), 194303.
Abstract: Demand for efficient terahertz radiation detectors resulted in intensive study of the asymmetric carbon nanostructures as a possible solution for that problem. It was maintained that photothermoelectric effect under certain conditions results in strong response of such devices to terahertz radiation even at room temperature. In this work, we investigate different mechanisms underlying the response of asymmetric carbon nanotube (CNT) based devices to sub-terahertz and terahertz radiation. Our structures are formed with CNT networks instead of individual CNTs so that effects probed are more generic and not caused by peculiarities of an individual nanoscale object. We conclude that the DC voltage response observed in our structures is not only thermal in origin. So called diode-type response caused by asymmetry of the device IV characteristic turns out to be dominant at room temperature. Quantitative analysis provides further routes for the optimization of the device configuration, which may result in appearance of novel terahertz radiation detectors.
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Zhang, J., Slysz, W., Verevkin, A., Okunev, O., Chulkova, G., Korneev, A., et al. (2003). Response time characterization of NbN superconducting single-photon detectors. IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond., 13(2), 180–183.
Abstract: We report our time-resolved measurements of NbN-based superconducting single-photon detectors. The structures are meander-type, 10-nm thick, and 200-nm wide stripes and were operated at 4.2 K. We have shown that the NbN devices can count single-photon pulses with below 100-ps time resolution. The response signal pulse width was about 150 ps, and the system jitter was measured to be 35 ps.
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Gershenzon, E. M., Gol'tsman, G. N., Potapov, V. D., & Sergeev, A. V. (1991). Restriction of microwave enhancement of superconductivity in impure superconductors due to electron-electron interaction. Phys. B Condens. Mat., 169(1-4), 629–630.
Abstract: Transition from microwave enhancement of supercurrent to superconductivity suppression is investigated in impure superconductors. It is demonstrated that frequency range of enhancement effect narrows with the decrease of electron mean free path, ℓ, and at ℓ⩽1nm electron heating is observed in the whole frequency range. Dependences of frequency boundaries on ℓ are explained by taking into account strong electron-electron interaction in impure metals.
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Gershenzon, E. M., Gol'tsman, G. N., Potapov, V. D., & Sergeev, A. V. (1990). Restriction of microwave enhancement of superconductivity in impure superconductors due to electron-electron interaction. Solid State Communications, 75(8), 639–641.
Abstract: Transition from microwave enhancement of supercurrent to superconductivity suppression is investigated in impure superconductors. It is demonstrated that the frequency range of the enhancement effect narrows with the decrease of the electron mean free path, l, and at l ⩽ 1 nm electron heating is observed in the whole frequency range. Dependences of frequency boundaries on l are explained by taking into account strong electron-electron interaction in impure metals.
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Maslennikov, S. (2014). RF heating efficiency of the terahertz superconducting hot-electron bolometer. arXiv, 1404.5276, arXiv:1404.5276.
Abstract: We report results of the numerical solution by the Euler method of the system of heat balance equations written in recurrent form for the superconducting hot-electron bolometer (HEB) embedded in an electrical circuit. By taking into account the dependence of the HEB resistance on the transport current we have been able to calculate rigorously the RF heating efficiency, absorbed local oscillator (LO) power and conversion gain of the HEB mixer. We show that the calculated conversion gai nis in excellent agreement with the experimental results, and that the substitution of the calculated RF heating efficiency and absorbed LO power into the expressions for the conversion gain and noise temperature given by the analytical small-signal model of the HEB yields excellent agreement with the corresponding measured values
Keywords: superconducting hot-electron bolometer mixer, HEB, NbN, distributed model, HEB model, HEB mixer model, heat balance equa-tions, conversion gain, RF heating efficiency, noise temperature, simulation, Euler method
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Smirnov, K. V., Divochiy, A. V., Vakhtomin, Y. B., Sidorova, M. V., Karpova, U. V., Morozov, P. V., et al. (2016). Rise time of voltage pulses in NbN superconducting single photon detectors. Appl. Phys. Lett., 109(5), 052601.
Abstract: We have found experimentally that the rise time of voltage pulse in NbN superconducting single photon detectors increases nonlinearly with increasing the length of the detector L. The effect is connected with dependence of resistance of the detector Rn, which appears after photon absorption, on its kinetic inductance Lk and, hence, on the length of the detector. This conclusion is confirmed by our calculations in the framework of two temperature model.
D.Yu.V. acknowledges the support from the Russian Foundation for Basic Research (Project No. 15-42-02365). K.V.S. acknowledges the financial support from the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation (Contract No. 3.2655.2014/K).
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