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Superconducting Nanowire Single-Photon Detector

Interactive 3D SNSPD simulator: fire single photons at a cryogenic superconducting nanowire biased near its critical current, watch each absorption nucleate and expand a resistive hotspot into a voltage pulse, and explore the narrow bias window between missed events and spurious dark counts.

Quantum Computing3DAdvanced60 FPS🔥 Fire ❄️ Ice & Cold

A meandering superconducting nanowire sits on a simulated cryostat stage, biased just below its critical current. Fire single photons at it and watch each absorption nucleate a resistive hotspot that snaps across the wire's full width, forces the bias current to detour, and produces a sharp voltage pulse on the oscilloscope trace before the wire cools back to zero resistance. Slide the bias current below its optimal window and photons stop registering; push it above the window and the wire starts firing — or latching — on its own, with no photon required.

⚙ Under the hood

Fire single photons at a cryogenic superconducting nanowire biased near its critical current. Each absorption nucleates a resistive hotspot that expands into a sharp voltage pulse on a live oscilloscope trace before the wire recovers — tune the bias too low and photons stop registering, tune it too high and the wire fires (or latches) on its own.

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3D · Three.js / WebGL renderer · 60 FPS target · runs fully client-side, no install