Cryogenic low-noise amplifiers for measurements with superconducting detectors

We designed, implemented, and characterized differential amplifiers for cryogenic temperatures based on Si bipolar junction transistor technology. The amplifiers show high gain values of more than 60 dB at 300, 77, and 48 K. The minimum voltage noise spectral density was achieved at 77 K and corresponded to 0.33 nV/Hz(0.5) with a flicker noise of 20 Hz. The maximum voltage gain was 70 dB at 77 K for a frequency range from DC to 17 kHz. We experimentally show that the parallel differential circuit design allows for a reduction of the voltage noise from 0.55 to 0.33 nV/Hz(0.5) at 77 K.