Noise and Bandwidth Measurements of Diffusion-Cooled Nb Hot-Electron Bolometer Mixers at Frequencies Above the Superconductive Energy Gap

Diffusion-cooled Nb hot-electron bolometer (HEB) mixers have the potential to simultaneously achieve high intermediate frequency (IF) bandwidths and low mixer noise temperatures for operation at THz frequencies (above the superconductive gap energy). We have measured the IF signal bandwidth at 630 GHz of Nb devices with lengths L = 0.3, 0.2, and 0.111M in a quasioptical mixer configuration employing twin-slot antennas. The 3-dB IF bandwidth increased from 1.2 GHz for the 0.3 pm long device to 9.2 GHz for the 0.11M1 lon g device. These results demonstrate the expected 1/L 2 dependence of

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