Patent attributes
A superconducting thermal detector (bolometer) of THz (sub-millimeter) wave radiation based on sensing the change in the amplitude or phase of a resonator circuit, consisting of a capacitor (Csh) and a superconducting temperature dependent inductor where the said inductor is thermally isolated from the heat bath (chip substrate) by micro-suspensions. The bolometer design includes a thin film inductor located on the membrane, a single or/and multi-layered thin film capacitor, and a thin film absorber of incoming radiation. The bolometer design can also include a lithographic antenna with antenna termination and/or a back reflector beneath the membrane for optimal wavelength detection by the resonance circuit. The superconducting thermal detector (bolometer) and arrays of these detectors operate in a temperature range from 1 Kelvin to 10 Kelvin.
