Low-noise 0.8-0.96- and 0.96-1.12-THz superconductor-insulator-superconductor mixers for the Herschel Space Observatory
Abstract
Heterodyne mixers incorporating Nb SIS junctions and NbTiN-SiO/sub 2/-Al microstrip tuning circuits offer the lowest reported receiver noise temperatures to date in the 0.8-0.96- and 0.96-1.12-THz frequency bands. In particular, improvements in the quality of the NbTiN ground plane of the SIS devices' on-chip microstrip tuning circuits have yielded significant improvements in the sensitivity of the 0.96-1.12-THz mixers relative to previously presented results. Additionally, an optimized RF design incorporating a reduced-height waveguide and suspended stripline RF choke filter offers significantly larger operating bandwidths than were obtained with mixers that incorporated full-height waveguides near 1 THz. Finally, the impact of junction current density and quality on the performance of the 0.8-0.96-THz mixers is discussed and compared with measured mixer sensitivities, as are the relative sensitivities of the 0.8-0.96- and 0.96-1.12-THz mixers.
Additional Information
© Copyright 2006 IEEE. Reprinted with permission. Manuscript received February 4, 2005; revised July 13, 2005. [Posted online: 2006-02-06] This work was supported in part by the Technologiestichting STW (of The Netherlands), by the Nederlandse Organizatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek, and by the European Space Agency under the European Space Research and Technology Centre Research Contract 11653/95. The authors would like to thank W. Laauwen and L. de Jong for performing the mixer measurements described here, M. Eggens, H. Golstein, S. Kikken, D. Nguyen, C. Pieters, H. Schaeffer, and H. Smit for their contributions to the design and construction of the mixers and test systems that were used in this work, and A. Baryshev, J. R. Gao, T. de Graauw, N. Honingh, R. LeDuc, B. Leone, S. Shitov, N. Whyborn, and J. Zmuidzinas for useful discussions.Files
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- CaltechAUTHORS:JACieeetmtt06
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2006-11-30Created from EPrint's datestamp field
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2021-11-08Created from EPrint's last_modified field