LAUSR

Increasing the count rate (CR) is one of the key issues in the development of superconducting nanowire single-photon detectors (SNSPDs) for different applications. This study aims to design, fabricate, and analyze a 16-pixel interleaved nanowire SNSPD array, which exhibits a system detection efficiency (SDE) of 72% and a dark CR of 100 Hz at a low-photon-flux limit and a wavelength of 1550 nm. By exploiting the increased pixel number and reduced dead time (<5 ns) of each nanowire, the SNSPD array attained a maximum CR of 1.5 GHz with an SDE of ∼12% at a photon flux of 1.26 × 1010 photons/s. Moreover, the SNSPD achieved a photon number resolution of up to 16 photons.