Noise, Gain, and Responsivity in Low-Strain Quantum Dot Infrared Photodetectors With up to 80 Dot-in-a-Well Periods

Author

Vines, Peter ; Tan, Chee Hing ; David, John P R ; Attaluri, Ram S. ; Vandervelde, Thomas Edwin ; Krishna, Sanjay

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electron. & Electr. Eng., Univ. of Sheffield, Sheffield, UK

Volume

47

Issue

5

fYear

2011

fDate

5/1/2011 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

607

Lastpage

613

Abstract

We present a systematic study of noise, gain, responsivity, and specific detectivity D* , in a series of low-strain dot-in-a-well (DWELL) quantum dot infrared photodetectors (QDIPs). The lattice-matched GaAs quantum wells and AlGaAs barriers in these devices prevent the accumulation of excessive strain and allow the growth of up to 80 DWELL periods. We show that the photoconductive gain in these QDIPs is inversely proportional to the number of periods, while the total quantum efficiency is proportional to the number of periods, meaning that the responsivity remains constant at a given mean electric field as the number of periods is varied. The dark current in each QDIP was also found to be constant at a given mean electric field.

Keywords

gallium arsenide; infrared detectors; photodetectors; semiconductor device measurement; semiconductor device noise; semiconductor quantum dots; AlGaAs; DWELL; GaAs; QDIP; dark current; dot-in-a-well; gain; noise; photoconductive gain; quantum dot infrared photodetectors; quantum efficiency; responsivity; specific detectivity; Current measurement; Dark current; Diamond-like carbon; Gallium arsenide; Measurement uncertainty; Noise; Quantum dots; Dot-in-a-well; gain; noise; period; quantum dot infrared photodetectors; responsivity; specific detectivity;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Quantum Electronics, IEEE Journal of

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9197

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/JQE.2011.2107732

Filename

5738961