|
|
Smirnov, K., Moshkova, M., Antipov, A., Morozov, P., & Vakhtomin, Y. (2021). The cascade switching of the photon number resolving superconducting single-photon detectors. IEEE Trans. Appl. Supercond., 31(2), 1–4.
Abstract: In this article, present the first detailed study of cascade switching in superconducting photon number resolving detectors. The detectors were made in the form of four parallel nanowires, coupled with the single-mode optical fiber and mounted into a closed-cycle refrigerator with a temperature of 2.1 K. We found out the value of additional false pulses (N cas.sw. ) appearing due to cascade switching and showed that it is possible to set up the detector bias current that corresponds to a high level of the detection efficiency and a low level of N cas.sw. simultaneously. We reached the detection efficiency of 60% and N cas.sw. = 0.3%.
|
|
|
|
Baksheeva, K., Ozhegov, R., Goltsman, G., Kinev, N., Koshelets, V., Kochnev, A., et al. (2021). The sub THz emission of the human body under physiological stress. IEEE Trans. Terahertz Sci. Technol., .
Abstract: We present evidence that in the sub-THz frequency band, human skin can be considered as an electromagnetic bio-metamaterial, in that its natural emission is a product of skin tissue geometry and embedded structures. Radiometry was performed on 32 human subjects from 480 to 700 GHz. Concurrently, the subjects were exposed to stress, while heart pulse rate (PS) and galvanic skin response (GSR) were also measured. The results are substantially different from the expected black body radiation signal of the skin surface. PS and GSR correlate to the emissivity. Using a simulation model for the skin, we find that the sweat duct is a critical element. The simulated frequency spectra qualitatively match the measured emission spectra and show that our sub-THz emission is modulated by our level of mental stress. This opens avenues for the remote monitoring of the human state.
|
|
|
|
Baeva, E. M., Titova, N. A., Veyrat, L., Sacépé, B., Semenov, A. V., Goltsman, G. N., et al. (2021). Thermal relaxation in metal films limited by diffuson lattice excitations of amorphous substrates. Phys. Rev. Applied, 15(5), 054014.
Abstract: We examine the role of a silicon-based amorphous insulating substrate in the thermal relaxation in thin NbN, InOx, and Au/Ni films at temperatures above 5 K. The samples studied consist of metal bridges on an amorphous insulating layer lying on or suspended above a crystalline substrate. Noise thermometry is used to measure the electron temperature Te of the films as a function of Joule power per unit area P2D. In all samples, we observe a P2D∝Tne dependence, with exponent n≃2, which is inconsistent with both electron-phonon coupling and Kapitza thermal resistance. In suspended samples, the functional dependence of P2D(Te) on the length of the amorphous insulating layer is consistent with the linear temperature dependence of the thermal conductivity, which is related to lattice excitations (diffusons) for a phonon mean free path shorter than the dominant phonon wavelength. Our findings are important for understanding the operation of devices embedded in amorphous dielectrics.
|
|
|
|
Lobanov, Y. V., Vakhtomin, Y. B., Pentin, I. V., Rosental, V. A., Smirnov, K. V., Goltsman, G. N., et al. (2021). Time-resolved measurements of light–current characteristic and mode competition in pulsed THz quantum cascade laser. Optical Engineering, 60(8), 1–8.
Abstract: Quantum cascade lasers (QCL) are widely adopted as prominent and easy-to-use solid-state sources of terahertz radiation. Yet some applications require generation and detection of very sharp and narrow terahertz-range pulses with a specific spectral composition. We have studied time-resolved light-current (L–I) characteristics of multimode THz QCL operated with a fast ramp of the injection current. Detection of THz pulses was carried out using an NbN superconducting hot-electron bolometer with the time constant of the order of 1 ns while the laser bias current was swept during a single driving pulse. A nonmonotonic behavior of the L–I characteristic with several visually separated subpeaks was found. This behavior is associated with the mode competition in THz QCL cavity, which we confirm by L–I measurements with use of an external Fabry–Perot interferometer for a discrete mode selection. We also have demonstrated the possibility to control the L–I shape with suppression of one of the subpeaks by simply adjusting the off-axis parabolic mirror for optimal optical alignment for one of the laser modes. The developed technique paves the way for rapid characterization of pulsed THz QCLs for further studies of the possibilities of using this approach in remote sensing.
|
|
|
|
Gayduchenko, I., Xu, S. G., Alymov, G., Moskotin, M., Tretyakov, I., Taniguchi, T., et al. (2021). Tunnel field-effect transistors for sensitive terahertz detection. Nat. Commun., 12(1), 543.
Abstract: The rectification of electromagnetic waves to direct currents is a crucial process for energy harvesting, beyond-5G wireless communications, ultra-fast science, and observational astronomy. As the radiation frequency is raised to the sub-terahertz (THz) domain, ac-to-dc conversion by conventional electronics becomes challenging and requires alternative rectification protocols. Here, we address this challenge by tunnel field-effect transistors made of bilayer graphene (BLG). Taking advantage of BLG's electrically tunable band structure, we create a lateral tunnel junction and couple it to an antenna exposed to THz radiation. The incoming radiation is then down-converted by the tunnel junction nonlinearity, resulting in high responsivity (>4 kV/W) and low-noise (0.2 pW/[Formula: see text]) detection. We demonstrate how switching from intraband Ohmic to interband tunneling regime can raise detectors' responsivity by few orders of magnitude, in agreement with the developed theory. Our work demonstrates a potential application of tunnel transistors for THz detection and reveals BLG as a promising platform therefor.
|
|
|
|
Tretyakov, I., Svyatodukh, S., Perepelitsa, A., Ryabchun, S., Kaurova, N., Shurakov, A., et al. (2020). Ag2S QDs/Si heterostructure-based ultrasensitive SWIR range detector. Nanomaterials (Basel), 10(5), 1–12.
Abstract: In the 20(th) century, microelectronics was revolutionized by silicon-its semiconducting properties finally made it possible to reduce the size of electronic components to a few nanometers. The ability to control the semiconducting properties of Si on the nanometer scale promises a breakthrough in the development of Si-based technologies. In this paper, we present the results of our experimental studies of the photovoltaic effect in Ag2S QD/Si heterostructures in the short-wave infrared range. At room temperature, the Ag2S/Si heterostructures offer a noise-equivalent power of 1.1 x 10(-10) W/ radicalHz. The spectral analysis of the photoresponse of the Ag2S/Si heterostructures has made it possible to identify two main mechanisms behind it: the absorption of IR radiation by defects in the crystalline structure of the Ag2S QDs or by quantum QD-induced surface states in Si. This study has demonstrated an effective and low-cost way to create a sensitive room temperature SWIR photodetector which would be compatible with the Si complementary metal oxide semiconductor technology.
|
|
|
|
Korneeva, Y. P., Manova, N. N., Florya, I. N., Mikhailov, M. Y., Dobrovolskiy, O. V., Korneev, A. A., et al. (2020). Different single-photon response of wide and narrow superconducting MoxSi1−x strips. Phys. Rev. Applied, 13(2), 024011 (1 to 7).
Abstract: The photon count rate (PCR) of superconducting single-photon detectors made of MoxSi1−x films shaped as a 2-μm-wide strip and a 115-nm-wide meander strip line is studied experimentally as a function of the dc biasing current at different values of the perpendicular magnetic field. For the wide strip, a crossover current Icross is observed, below which the PCR increases with an increasing magnetic field and above which it decreases. This behavior contrasts with the narrow MoxSi1−x meander, for which no crossover current is observed, thus suggesting different photon-detection mechanisms in the wide and narrow strips. Namely, we argue that in the wide strip the absorbed photon destroys superconductivity locally via the vortex-antivortex mechanism for the emergence of resistance, while in the narrow meander superconductivity is destroyed across the whole strip line, forming a hot belt. Accordingly, the different photon-detection mechanisms associated with vortices and the hot belt determine the qualitative difference in the dependence of the PCR on the magnetic field.
|
|
|
|
Sidorova, M., Semenov, A. D., Hübers, H. - W., Ilin, K., Siegel, M., Charaev, I., et al. (2020). Electron energy relaxation in disordered superconducting NbN films. Phys. Rev. B, 102(5), 054501 (1 to 15).
Abstract: We report on the inelastic-scattering rate of electrons on phonons and relaxation of electron energy studied by means of magnetoconductance, and photoresponse, respectively, in a series of strongly disordered superconducting NbN films. The studied films with thicknesses in the range from 3 to 33 nm are characterized by different Ioffe-Regel parameters but an almost constant product qTl (qT is the wave vector of thermal phonons and l is the elastic mean free path of electrons). In the temperature range 14–30 K, the electron-phonon scattering rates obey temperature dependencies close to the power law 1/τe−ph∼Tn with the exponents n≈3.2–3.8. We found that in this temperature range τe−ph and n of studied films vary weakly with the thickness and square resistance. At 10 K electron-phonon scattering times are in the range 11.9–17.5 ps. The data extracted from magnetoconductance measurements were used to describe the experimental photoresponse with the two-temperature model. For thick films, the photoresponse is reasonably well described without fitting parameters, however, for thinner films, the fit requires a smaller heat capacity of phonons. We attribute this finding to the reduced density of phonon states in thin films at low temperatures. We also show that the estimated Debye temperature in the studied NbN films is noticeably smaller than in bulk material.
|
|
|
|
Matyushkin, Y., Danilov, S., Moskotin, M., Belosevich, V., Kaurova, N., Rybin, M., et al. (2020). Helicity-sensitive plasmonic terahertz interferometer. Nano Lett., 20(10), 7296–7303.
Abstract: Plasmonic interferometry is a rapidly growing area of research with a huge potential for applications in the terahertz frequency range. In this Letter, we explore a plasmonic interferometer based on graphene field effect transistor connected to specially designed antennas. As a key result, we observe helicity- and phase-sensitive conversion of circularly polarized radiation into dc photovoltage caused by the plasmon-interference mechanism: two plasma waves, excited at the source and drain part of the transistor, interfere inside the channel. The helicity-sensitive phase shift between these waves is achieved by using an asymmetric antenna configuration. The dc signal changes sign with inversion of the helicity. A suggested plasmonic interferometer is capable of measuring the phase difference between two arbitrary phase-shifted optical signals. The observed effect opens a wide avenue for phase-sensitive probing of plasma wave excitations in two-dimensional materials.
|
|
|
|
Pentin, I., Vakhtomin, Y., Seleznev, V., & Smirnov, K. (2020). Hot electron energy relaxation time in vanadium nitride superconducting film structures under THz and IR radiation. Sci. Rep., 10(1), 16819.
Abstract: The paper presents the experimental results of studying the dynamics of electron energy relaxation in structures made of thin (d approximately 6 nm) disordered superconducting vanadium nitride (VN) films converted to a resistive state by high-frequency radiation and transport current. Under conditions of quasi-equilibrium superconductivity and temperature range close to critical (~ Tc), a direct measurement of the energy relaxation time of electrons by the beats method arising from two monochromatic sources with close frequencies radiation in sub-THz region (omega approximately 0.140 THz) and sources in the IR region (omega approximately 193 THz) was conducted. The measured time of energy relaxation of electrons in the studied VN structures upon heating of THz and IR radiation completely coincided and amounted to (2.6-2.7) ns. The studied response of VN structures to IR (omega approximately 193 THz) picosecond laser pulses also allowed us to estimate the energy relaxation time in VN structures, which was ~ 2.8 ns and is in good agreement with the result obtained by the mixing method. Also, we present the experimentally measured volt-watt responsivity (S~) within the frequency range omega approximately (0.3-6) THz VN HEB detector. The estimated values of noise equivalent power (NEP) for VN HEB and its minimum energy level (deltaE) reached NEP@1MHz approximately 6.3 x 10(-14) W/ radicalHz and deltaE approximately 8.1 x 10(-18) J, respectively.
|
|
