Accurate electromagnetic modeling of terahertz detectors
Twin slot antennas coupled to superconducting devices have been developed over the years as single pixel detectors in the terahertz (THz) frequency range for space-based and astronomy applications. Used either for mixing or direct detection, they have been object of several investigations, and are currently being developed for several missions funded or co-funded by NASA. Although they have shown promising performance in terms of noise and sensitivity, so far they have usually also shown a considerable disagreement in terms of performance between calculations and measurements, especially when considering center frequency and bandwidth. In this paper we present a thorough and accurate electromagnetic model of complete detector and we compare the results of calculations with measurements. Starting from a model of the embedding circuit, the effect of all the other elements in the detector in the coupled power have been analyzed. An extensive variety of measured and calculated data, as presented in this paper, demonstrates the effectiveness and reliability of the electromagnetic model at frequencies between 600 GHz and 2.5THz.