Tomlin, N.
, Lehman, J.
and Nam, S.
(2012),
Towards a fiber-coupled picowatt cryogenic radiometer, Applied Physics Letters, [online], https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=910378 (Accessed May 8, 2026)
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Towards a fiber-coupled picowatt cryogenic radiometer
Published
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Abstract
A picowatt cryogenic radiometer (PCR) has been fabricated at the microscale level for electrical substitution optical fiber power measurements. The absorber, electrical heater, and thermometer are all on a micromachined membrane less than 1mm on a side. Initial measurements with input powers from 50 fW to 20 nW show a response inequivalence between electrical and optical power of 8%. A comparison of the response to electrical and optical input powers between 15 pW to 70 pW yields a repeatability better than {+or-} 0.3 % (k = 2). From our first optical tests, the system has a noise equivalent power of ≅5× 10-15 W∕ √Hz at 2 Hz, but simple changes to the measurement scheme should yield an NEP 2 orders of magnitude lower.Citation
Applied Physics Letters
Volume
37
Issue
12
Pub Type
Journals
Download Paper
Keywords
absolute cryogenic radiometer, picowatt, pW, transition-edge sensor, TES, ACR, radiometer
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Created June 11, 2012, Updated February 19, 2017