Stabilization Scheme for Hot-Electron Bolometer Receivers Using Microwave Radiation

Author

Ryabchun, Sergey ; Tong, Cheuk-Yu Edward ; Blundell, Raymond ; Gol´tsman, Gregory

Author_Institution

Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophys., Cambridge, MA

Volume

19

Issue

1

fYear

2009

Firstpage

14

Lastpage

19

Abstract

We present the results of a stabilization scheme for terahertz receivers based on NbN hot-electron bolometer (HEB) mixers that uses microwave radiation with a frequency much lower than the gap frequency of NbN to compensate for mixer current fluctuations. A feedback control loop, which actively controls the power level of the injected microwave radiation, has successfully been implemented to stabilize the operating point of the HEB mixer. This allows us to increase the receiver Allan time to 10 s and also improve the temperature resolution of the receiver by about 30% in the total power mode of operation.

Keywords

bolometers; current fluctuations; niobium compounds; submillimetre wave mixers; submillimetre wave receivers; superconducting microwave devices; Allan time; current fluctuations; feedback control loop; gap frequency; hot-electron bolometer mixers; microwave radiation; stabilization; terahertz receivers; time 10 s; Allan variance; hot-electron bolometer (HEB) mixer; radiometer equation; terahertz receivers;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Applied Superconductivity, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Location

12/12/2008 12:00:00 AM

ISSN

1051-8223

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TASC.2008.2008398

Filename

4711088