Abbas Haddadi

High operating temperature midwave infrared photodiodes and focal plane arrays based on type-II InAs/GaSb superlattices

The dominant dark current mechanisms are identified and suppressed to improve the performance of midwave infrared InAs/GaSb type-II superlattice photodiodes at high temperatures. The optimized heterojunction photodiode exhibits a quantum efficiency of 50% for 2 μm thick active region without any bias dependence. At 150 K, R0A of 5100 Ω cm2 and specific detectivity of 1.05×1012 cm Hz0.5/W are demonstrated for a 50% cutoff wavelength of 4.2μm. Assuming 300 K background temperature and 2π field of view, the performance of the detector is background limited up to 180 K, which is improved by 25 °C compared to the homojunction photodiode. Infrared imaging using f/2.3 optics and an integration time of 10.02 ms demonstrates a noise equivalent temperature difference of 11 mK at operating temperatures below 120 K.

High power broad area quantum cascade lasers

Broad area quantum cascade lasers (QCLs) are studied with ridge widths up to 400 μm, in room temperature pulsed mode operation at an emission wavelength around 4.45 μm. The peak output power scales linearly with the ridge width. A maximum total peak output power of 120 W is obtained from a single 400-μm-wide device with a cavity length of 3 mm. A stable far field emission characteristic is observed with dual lobes at ±38° for all tested devices, which suggests that these broad area QCLs are highly resistant to filamentation.

Demonstration of shortwavelength infrared photodiodes based on type-II InAs/GaSb/AlSb superlattices

We demonstrate the feasibility of the InAs/GaSb/AlSb type-II superlattice photodiodes operating at the short wavelength infrared regime below 3 μm. An n-i-p type-II InAs/GaSb/AlSb photodiode was grown with a designed cut-off wavelength of 2 μm on a GaSb substrate. At 150 K, the photodiode exhibited a dark current density of 5.6 × 10−8 A/cm2 and a front-side-illuminated quantum efficiency of 40.3%, providing an associated shot noise detectivity of 1.0 × 1013 Jones. The uncooled photodiode showed a dark current density of 2.2 × 10−3 A/cm2 and a quantum efficiency of 41.5%, resulting in a detectivity of 1.7 × 1010 Jones.

InAs/InAs1−xSbx type-II superlattices for high performance long wavelength infrared detection

High performance long-wavelength infrared nBn photodetectors based on InAs/InAs1−xSbx type-II superlattices on GaSb substrate have been demonstrated. The photodetectors 50% cut-off wavelength was ∼10 μm at 77 K. The photodetector with a 6 μm-thick absorption region exhibited a peak responsivity of 4.47 A/W at 7.9 μm, corresponding to a quantum efficiency of 54% at −90 mV bias voltage under front-side illumination and without any anti-reflection coating. With an R × A of 119 Ω·cm2 and a dark current density of 4.4 × 10−4 A/cm2 under −90 mV applied bias at 77 K, the photodetector exhibited a specific detectivity of 2.8 × 1011 cm. Hz/W.

High performance photodiodes based on InAs/InAsSb type-II superlattices for very long wavelength infrared detection

Very long wavelength infrared photodetectors based on InAs/InAsSb type-II superlattices are demonstrated on GaSb substrate. A heterostructure photodiode was grown with 50% cut-off wavelength of 14.6 μm. At 77 K, the photodiode exhibited a peak responsivity of 4.8 A/W, corresponding to a quantum efficiency of 46% at −300 mV bias voltage from front side illumination without antireflective coating. With the dark current density of 0.7 A/cm2, it provided a specific detectivity of 1.4 × 1010 Jones. The device performance was investigated as a function of operating temperature, revealing a very stable optical response and a background limited performance below 50 K.

Demonstration of high performance bias-selectable dual-band short-/mid-wavelength infrared photodetectors based on type-II InAs/GaSb/AlSb superlattices

High performance bias-selectable dual-band short-/mid-wavelength infrared photodetector based on InAs/GaSb/AlSb type-II superlattice with designed cut-off wavelengths of 2 μm and 4 μm was demonstrated. At 150 K, the short-wave channel exhibited a quantum efficiency of 55%, a dark current density of 1.0 × 10−9 A/cm2 at −50 mV bias voltage, providing an associated shot noise detectivity of 3.0 × 1013 Jones. The mid-wavelength channel exhibited a quantum efficiency of 33% and a dark current density of 2.6 × 10−5 A/cm2 at 300 mV bias voltage, resulting in a detectivity of 4.0 × 1011 Jones. The spectral cross-talk between the two channels was also discussed for further optimization.

High power frequency comb based on mid-infrared quantum cascade laser at λ ∼ 9 μm

We investigate a frequency comb source based on a mid-infrared quantum cascade laser at λ ∼ 9 μm with high power output. A broad flat-top gain with near-zero group velocity dispersion has been engineered using a dual-core active region structure. This favors the locking of the dispersed Fabry-Perot modes into equally spaced frequency lines via four wave mixing. A current range with a narrow intermode beating linewidth of 3 kHz is identified with a fast detector and spectrum analyzer. This range corresponds to a broad spectral coverage of 65 cm−1 and a high power output of 180 mW for ∼176 comb modes.

High Operability 1024

Electrical and radiometric characterization results of a high-operability1024 × 1024 long wavelength infrared type-II superlattice focal plane array are described. It demonstrates excellent quantum efficiency operability of 95.8% and 97.4% at operating temperatures of 81 K and 68 K, respectively. The external quantum efficiency is 81% without any antireflective coating. The dynamic range is 37 dB at 81 K and increases to 39 dB at 68 K operating temperature. The focal plane array has noise equivalent temperature difference as low as 27 mK and 19 mK at operating temperatures of 81 K and 68 K, respectively, using f/2 optics and an integration time of 0.13 ms.

\,\times\,

We report a high performance long-wavelength IR dual-band imager based on type-II superlattices with 100% cutoff wavelengths at 9.5 μm (blue channel) and 13 μm (red channel). Test pixels reveal background-limited behavior with specific detectivities as high as ~5×10¹¹ Jones at 7.9 μm in the blue channel and ~1×10¹¹ Jones at 10.2 μm in the red channel at 77 K. These performances were attributed to low dark currents thanks to the M-barrier and Fabry-Perot enhanced quantum efficiencies despite using thin 2 μm absorbing regions. In the imager, the high signal-to-noise ratio contributed to median noise equivalent temperature differences of ~20 milli-Kelvin for both channels with integration times on the order of 0.5 ms, making it suitable for high speed applications.

1024 Long Wavelength Type-II Superlattice Focal Plane Array

We report a two-color mid-wave infrared (MWIR) and long-wave infrared (LWIR) co-located detector with 3 μm active region thickness per channel that is highly selective and can perform under high operating temperatures for the MWIR band. Under back-side illumination, a temperature evolution study of the MWIR detectors electro-optical performance found the 300 K background-limit with 2π field-of-view to be achieved below operating temperatures of 160 K, at which the temperatures 50% cutoff wavelength was 5.2 μm. The measured current reached the system limit of 0.1 pA at 110 K for 30 μm pixel-sized diodes. At 77 K, where the LWIR channel operated with a 50% cutoff wavelength at 11.2 μm, an LWIR selectivity of ~17% was achieved in the MWIR wave band between 3 and 4.7 μm, making the detector highly selective.