Study of the active electrothermal negative-feedback regime for a high-temperature superconductor bolometer

This paper presents comparative studies of the operation of a high-temperature superconductor bolometer in two regimes-conventional and with active electrothermal negative feedback. It is shown experimentally that the bolometer's response rate can be improved by more than an order of magnitude in the latter regime. The effect of the regime on the noise characteristics of the device is studied. For the specific layout presented here, an estimate using the parameter D*/tau (1/2) shows that the regime with active electrothermal negative feedback has an advantage if high response rate is required in the bolometer. (C) 2001 The Optical Society of America.