Title

Optical response of laser-doped silicon carbide for an uncooled midwave infrared detector

Authors

Authors

G. Lim; T. Manzur;A. Kar

Comments

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Abbreviated Journal Title

Appl. Optics

Keywords

SWITCHING DEVICES; PHOTODIODES; CHROMIUM; DOPANTS; Optics

Abstract

An uncooled mid-wave infrared (MWIR) detector is developed by doping an n-type 4H-SiC with Ga using a laser doping technique. 4H-SiC is one of the polytypes of crystalline silicon carbide and a wide bandgap semiconductor. The dopant creates an energy level of 0: 30 eV, which was confirmed by optical spectroscopy of the doped sample. This energy level corresponds to the MWIR wavelength of 4: 21 mu m. The detection mechanism is based on the photoexcitation of electrons by the photons of this wavelength absorbed in the semiconductor. This process modifies the electron density, which changes the refractive index, and, therefore, the reflectance of the semiconductor is also changed. The change in the reflectance, which is the optical response of the detector, can be measured remotely with a laser beam, such as a He-Ne laser. This capability of measuring the detector response remotely makes it a wireless detector. The variation of refractive index was calculated as a function of absorbed irradiance based on the reflectance data for the as-received and doped samples. A distinct change was observed for the refractive index of the doped sample, indicating that the detector is suitable for applications at the 4: 21 mu m wavelength. (C) 2011 Optical Society of America

Journal Title

Applied Optics

Volume

50

Issue/Number

17

Publication Date

1-1-2011

Document Type

Article

Language

English

First Page

2640

Last Page

2653

WOS Identifier

WOS:000291872800019

ISSN

1559-128X

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