Noise Behaviour of a THz Superconducting Hot-Electron Bolometer Mixer

A quasi-optical superconducting NbN hot-electron bolometer (HEB) mixer is measured in the frequency range of 0.5--2.5THz for understanding of the frequency dependence of noise temperature of THz coherent detectors. It has been found that noise temperature increasing with frequency is mainly due to the coupling loss between the quasi-optical planar antenna and the superconducting HEB bridge when taking account of non-uniform distribution of high-frequency current. With the coupling loss corrected, the superconducting HEB mixer demonstrates a noise temperature nearly independent of frequency.