Waveguide Integrated SNSPDs on Foundry Silicon PICs

To address the NASA need for integrated photonic single photon detectors, memQ proposes to create superconducting nanowire single photon detectors (SNSPDs) through back-end-of-line fabrication on the 300mm silicon photonics platform at AIM photonics. Waveguide integrated SNSPDs offer un-matched performance in terms of efficiency and timing precision, and would benefit PIC based technologies such as LiDAR, optical communications, quantum systems, and sensing. In phase I, the feasibility of the approach will be investigated through fabrication and characterization of SNSPDs onto foundry PICs. In phase II, SNSPDs would be fabricated on 300mm wafer-scale and optimized for yield. At the end of phase II, this technology is expected to be ready (TRL-6) for development as a component on AIM’s platform - which will be the focus of a Phase III type effort.