Large active-area superconducting microwire detector array with single-photon sensitivity in the near-infrared

Creators: Luskin, Jamie S.; Schmidt, Ekkehart; Korzh, Boris; Beyer, Andrew D.; Bumble, Bruce; Allmaras, Jason P.; Walter, Alexander B.; Wollman, Emma E.; Narváez, Lautaro; Verma, Varun B.; Nam, Sae Woo; Charaev, Ilya; Colangelo, Marco; Berggren, Karl K.; Peña, Cristián; Spiropulu, Maria¹; Garcia-Sciveres, Maurice; Derenzo, Stephen; Shaw, Matthew D.

1. California Institute of Technology

Abstract

Superconducting nanowire single photon detectors (SNSPDs) are the highest-performing technology for time-resolved single-photon counting from the UV to the near-infrared. The recent discovery of single-photon sensitivity in micrometer-scale superconducting wires is a promising pathway to explore for large active area devices with application to dark matter searches and fundamental physics experiments. We present 8-pixel 1 mm² superconducting microwire single photon detectors (SMSPDs) with 1 μm-wide wires fabricated from WSi and MoSi films of various stoichiometries using electron-beam and optical lithography. Devices made from all materials and fabrication techniques show saturated internal detection efficiency at 1064 nm in at least one pixel, and the best performing device made from silicon-rich WSi shows single-photon sensitivity in all eight pixels and saturated internal detection efficiency in 6/8 pixels. This detector is the largest reported active-area SMSPD or SNSPD with near-IR sensitivity, and it extends the SMSPD to an array format. By further optimizing the photolithography techniques presented in this work, a viable pathway exists to realize larger devices with cm²-scale active area and beyond.

Additional Information

© 2023 Author(s). All article content, except where otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). We would like to thank Richard Muller from Jet Propulsion Laboratory for the electron-beam lithography of our samples. Part of this research was performed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (No. 80 NM0018D0004). The authors acknowledge support from the JPL Strategic Research and Technology Development program, the DARPA Defense Sciences Office, and the Quantum Information Science Enabled Discovery (QuantISED) program for High Energy Physics (No. KA2401032). The authors are also grateful to Sahil Patel for his help in editing the final manuscript. Data Availability: The data that support the findings of this study are openly available in Zenodo at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7644721, Ref. 59. Additional data are available from the corresponding authors upon reasonable request. Author Contributions: Jamie S. Luskin and Ekkehart Schmidt contributed equally to this paper. Jamie S. Luskin: Data curation (lead); Formal analysis (lead); Investigation (lead); Methodology (equal); Visualization (lead); Writing – original draft (lead); Writing – review & editing (equal). Varun B. Verma: Methodology (equal); Resources (equal). Sae Woo Nam: Methodology (equal); Resources (equal); Supervision (equal). Ilya Charaev: Formal analysis (equal); Methodology (equal); Resources (equal). Marco Colangelo: Methodology (equal); Resources (equal). Karl K. Berggren: Resources (equal); Supervision (equal). Cristián Peña: Resources (equal); Supervision (equal); Writing – review & editing (equal). Maria Spiropulu: Funding acquisition (equal); Project administration (equal); Resources (equal); Supervision (equal). Maurice Garcia-Sciveres: Funding acquisition (equal); Project administration (equal); Resources (equal); Supervision (equal). Stephen Derenzo: Project administration (equal); Resources (equal); Supervision (equal); Validation (equal). Matthew D. Shaw: Conceptualization (equal); Funding acquisition (equal); Project administration (equal); Supervision (lead); Validation (equal). Ekkehart Schmidt: Formal analysis (equal); Investigation (lead); Methodology (lead); Writing – review & editing (equal). Boris Korzh: Conceptualization (lead); Investigation (equal); Methodology (equal); Supervision (equal); Writing – review & editing (lead). Andrew Beyer: Methodology (equal); Supervision (equal). Bruce Bumble: Methodology (equal); Supervision (equal). Jason Allmaras: Methodology (equal); Supervision (equal); Validation (equal); Writing – review & editing (equal). Alexander Walter: Methodology (equal); Validation (equal). Emma Wollman: Project administration (equal); Supervision (equal); Validation (equal). Lautaro Narváez: Formal analysis (equal); Investigation (equal); Methodology (equal). The authors have no conflicts to disclose.

Attached Files

Published - 243506_1_5.0150282.pdf

Supplemental Material - r4D14dJ3.zip

Files

243506_1_5.0150282.pdf

Files (2.4 MB)

Name	Size	Download all
243506_1_5.0150282.pdf md5:53b18c558324abe5d17d9694df505ec5	1.8 MB	Preview Download
r4D14dJ3.zip md5:b7bf33bf7c538b6ae80f9387e5dd2fd7	570.7 kB	Preview Download

Additional details

	All versions	This version
Views	0	0
Downloads	0	0
Data volume	0 Bytes	0 Bytes