Lumped Element Kinetic Inductance Detectors for space applications

TL;DR

This paper investigates the performance and resilience of Lumped Element Kinetic Inductance Detectors (LEKID) for space applications, focusing on their interaction with ionizing particles and potential deployment in space-based observatories.

Contribution

It provides detailed experimental analysis of ionizing particle effects on LEKID arrays under space-like conditions and discusses a project to deploy LEKID on a stratospheric balloon.

Findings

LEKID arrays show specific responses to ionizing particles in simulated space conditions

A dedicated cryogenic setup was developed for testing LEKID in space-like environments

Initial balloon flight plans for LEKID demonstrate potential for space applications

Abstract

Kinetic Inductance Detectors (KID) are now routinely used in ground-based telescopes. Large arrays, deployed in formats up to kilopixels, exhibit state-of-the-art performance at millimeter (e.g. 120-300 GHz, NIKA and NIKA2 on the IRAM 30-meters) and sub-millimeter (e.g. 350-850 GHz AMKID on APEX) wavelengths. In view of future utilizations above the atmosphere, we have studied in detail the interaction of ionizing particles with LEKID (Lumped Element KID) arrays. We have constructed a dedicated cryogenic setup that allows to reproduce the typical observing conditions of a space-borne observatory. We will report the details and conclusions from a number of measurements. We give a brief description of our short term project, consisting in flying LEKID on a stratospheric balloon named B-SIDE.