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  • Open Access

Laser-induced relaxation oscillations in superconducting nanobridge single-photon detectors

F.B. Baalbergen1,*, I.E. Zadeh2, and M.J.A. de Dood1,†

  • *Contact author: baalbergen@physics.leidenuniv.nl
  • †Contact author: dood@physics.leidenuniv.nl
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Phys. Rev. Applied 23, 064038 – Published 16 June, 2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/cxv8-fqy9

Abstract

We demonstrate laser-induced relaxation oscillations in superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors (SNSPDs). These oscillations appear when a voltage-biased NbTiN nanobridge detector is illuminated with intense pulsed-laser light at a repetition rate of approximately 19MHz. They differ from the well-known relaxation oscillations by a stepwise increase in frequency and phase locking of the oscillations to the laser pulses. We create a model that incorporates electrical feedback and excludes thermal effects to simulate and explain the origin of the observed laser-induced relaxation oscillations. Qualitative agreement to the experiment is achieved using realistic values for the parameters in the model.

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Phys. Rev. Applied 23, 064038– Published 16 June, 2025
  • Received 11 November 2024
  • Revised 2 April 2025
  • Accepted 27 May 2025
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

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