Viacheslav Burenkov, University of Toronto

A single photon detector is an enabling technology for numerous applications and experiments in many different branches of physics. As such, the development of single photon detectors is a very active field of research. Recently, superconducting nanowire single photon detectors (SNSPDs) have become a prominent detector technology in the field of quantum information and beyond.

In this talk, Viacheslav Burenkov will review the physics and operation of these SNSPD detectors and discuss their current limitations. In particular, Burenkov will focus on the imperfections discovered, such as an unexpected detection efficiency recovery following a detection, and afterpulsing. In addition, he will present an overview of other ongoing research in his group that requires single photon detectors, including the recently developed measurement-device independent quantum key distribution, and quantum random number generators.

Viacheslav Burenkov was born in Voronezh, Russia before coming to Cardiff, UK. He received his M. Sci. in Physics from Imperial College London, UK in 2007. During this time, he completed a summer internship at CERN. After graduating he moved to Toronto, Canada to do a Ph. D. at the University of Toronto under the supervision of Prof. Hoi-Kwong Lo. His research is focused primarily on the security of practical quantum cryptography systems.