ELECTRON-HOLE BRANCH IMBALANCE IN SUPERCONDUCTORS INITIATED BY ABSORPTION OF HIGH-ENERGY QUANTA

The creation of quasiparticle branch imbalance in superconductors, whe n pumped by high-energy quanta, is considered. The physical basis for imbalance creation lies in the geometrical difference between the elec tron- and hole-like excitation densities of states in momentum space. Simple analytical solutions for distribution functions of electron- an d hole-like excitations are derived using appropriately modified kinet ic equations. The relevance of results to the problem of high-energy p article detection is discussed.