At the intersection of quantum science and high-energy particle physics, developments within the improvement and testing of the Superconducting Microwire Single-Photon Detector (SMSPD) may improve detection capabilities for high-energy particles in particle physics experiments.
The quest to know the basic constituents of the Universe – elementary particle physics and high-energy particle physics – is reaching a brand new frontier, pushed by transformative advances in quantum science and technology (QST). This confluence of fields is creating unprecedented alternatives, significantly in instrumentation, detector design, and the seek for physics past the Standard Model (BSM). Superconducting sensors (SNSPDs) optimised for charged particle detection will dramatically improve the capabilities for performing quantum tomography at colliders, permitting detailed detection of quantum entanglement and providing distinctive discovery potential for darkish sector particles.
Intersections of QIS and high-energy physics
The synergy between QST and HEP extends throughout theoretical and technological boundaries. On the theoretical facet, Quantum Information Science offers an mental stimulus for revolutionary fashions that deal with deep questions in regards to the quantum Universe. This consists of creating entanglement-based area concept fashions, exploring tensor networks, and addressing points like decoherence. Concepts from black gap physics, holographic correspondence, and quantum error corrections are converging to yield a deeper understanding of the Universe at its most elementary degree.
Crucially, the technological overlap focuses on utilizing quantum metrology to detect the extraordinarily faint indicators attribute of latest physics. Traditional searches for darkish matter, just like the Weakly Interacting Massive Particle (WIMP) paradigm, relied on conventional scattering ideas. However, the seek for lighter darkish matter candidates and new BSM particles requires the beautiful sensitivity of quantum gadgets. This new technology of experiments leverages gadgets like SQUIDs (Superconducting QUantum Interference Devices), Transition Edge Sensors (TESs), Microwave Kinetic Inductors (MKIDs), transmon qubits, and different quantum sensors to search for axions, darkish photons, and different unique phenomena. The most important sensible intersection in accelerator-based HEP, and the main target of this text, is the event of next-generation detectors that harness quantum results to attain unprecedented precision, with the current instance of the SMSPD arrays.
The quantum leap in detection: Initial SMSPD testing at Fermilab
Detecting high-energy particles like protons, electrons, and pions is a cornerstone of particle physics, but conventional detectors typically battle with the simultaneous necessities of excessive sensitivity, high-quality spatial decision, and picosecond-level time decision. The Superconducting Nanowire Single Photon Detector (SNSPD) technology, which has revolutionised quantum data science and astronomy with its ultra-low vitality threshold and distinctive timing, would possibly provide an answer.
To bridge the hole between the small energetic space of conventional SNSPDs and the wants of large-scale accelerator experiments, researchers from Fermilab, Caltech, and JPL developed a modified kind of gadget: SMSPD array. These gadgets utilise micrometer-width superconducting wires to create millimeter-square energetic areas — a big scaling achievement.
The first detailed characterisation of the SMSPD arrays with GeV-energy particles was printed in Journal of Instrumentation (JINST 20 P03001) in 2025. This foundational research uncovered an SMSPD array, fabricated with 1.5 μm large wires on a 3 nm tungsten silicide (WSi) movie, to 120 GeV protons and 8 GeV electrons and pions on the Fermilab Test Beam Facility (FTBF). Key outcomes from this pioneering work included:
- A fill factor-normalised detection effectivity of 60%.
- A time decision of 1.15 ns, which demonstrated the technology’s potential for precision timing in HEP.
- The use of a silicon monitoring telescope offered exact spatial decision, measuring 30 μm for protons and 130 μm for electrons and pions.
Advancing the state-of-the-art: The CERN take a look at beam follow-up
The success at Fermilab led to an accelerated follow-up research at a premier worldwide facility: the CERN Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) H6 beam line. This subsequent work, detailed within the arXiv pre-print Towards High-Efficiency Particle Detection Using Superconducting Microwire Arrays (arXiv:2510.11725), targeted on an improved sensor design.
The collaboration characterised a brand new 8-pixel 1×1 mm2 SMSPD array. This sensor featured a thicker, optimised 4.7 nm WSi movie and narrower 1μm large wires, aiming to boost each detection effectivity and timing precision. The gadget was examined with 120 GeV hadrons and 120 GeV muons.
The outcomes of the CERN take a look at demonstrated important efficiency beneficial properties, cementing the SMSPD’s standing as a number one candidate for next-generation detectors:
- Enhanced detection effectivity: The measured fill factor-normalised detection effectivity elevated to roughly 75%.
- Precision timing: The time decision was measured to be a outstanding 130 ps accross the array — a notable enchancment over the 1.5 ns achieved within the preliminary Fermilab assessments.
- Muon detection: This research additionally offered the primary SMSPD detection effectivity measurement for muons.
These findings signify a serious step in direction of creating high-efficiency charged particle monitoring methods with simultaneous precision timing. Such detectors are important for future accelerator-based experiments, together with the Electron-Ion Collider (EIC), the Future Circular Collider (FCC-ee/hh), and a Muon Collider.
The path to a quantum future: The INQNET programme
The technological breakthroughs in superconducting sensors mentioned right here usually are not remoted initiatives however are a part of a broader, long-term strategic imaginative and prescient to combine quantum applied sciences into elementary science, exemplified by the Intelligent Quantum Networks and Technologies (INQNET) analysis programme.
INQNET was collectively based in 2017 by the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) and AT&T. The programme’s power lies in its distinctive, collaborative mannequin that brings collectively main establishments from academia, business, and nationwide laboratories. Fermilab (FNAL) and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), managed by Caltech, have been the preliminary, important founding members of the collaboration.
This partnership leverages the respective strengths of the members: business for speedy useful resource allocation and scaling, academia for elementary analysis, and nationwide laboratories for large-scale infrastructure and deployments, and different experimental capabilities.
INQNET’s core mission is to speed up the event of scalable hybrid quantum networking and communications applied sciences, with early focuses on quantum networks and communications. The programme has been instrumental in establishing quantum community take a look at beds, such because the Fermilab Quantum Network (FQNET), which have demonstrated high-fidelity quantum teleportation over optical fibre. The sensor applied sciences — the identical ones now proving able to high-energy particle detection – have been initially developed at JPL and commissioned at INQNET-Caltech labs, underscoring the deep connection between quantum sensing for HEP and the broader effort to construct a quantum web.
This kind of consortium programme offers the required analysis and technology improvement framework to drive the basics of quantum physics into useful, superior applied sciences. How this analysis is efficiently built-in into the subsequent technology of experiments promising to unlock new discoveries in regards to the elementary nature of matter, vitality, house, and time is an open problem and alternative.
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