Thermoelectric radiation detector based on a superconductor-ferromagnet junction: Calorimetric regime

Abstract

We study the use of a thermoelectric junction as a thermal radiation detector in the calorimetric regime, where single radiation bursts can be separated in time domain. We focus especially on the case of a large thermoelectric figure of merit ZT affecting significantly, for example, the relevant thermal time scales. This work is motivated by the use of hybrid superconductor/ferromagnet systems in creating an unprecedentedly high low-temperature ZT even exceeding unity. Besides constructing a very general noise model which takes into account cross correlations between charge and heat noise, we show how the detector signal can be efficiently multiplexed by the use of resonant LC circuits giving a fingerprint to each pixel. We show that for realistic detectors operating at temperatures around 100 to 200 mK, the energy resolution can be as low as 1 meV. This allows for a broadband single-photon resolution at photon frequencies of the order of or below 1 THz.