AC-DC thermal converter with infrared-transmissive fiber coupling

AC-DC thermal converters are fabricated by depositing thin-film heaters on thin dielectric membranes on a silicon chip and by remotely sensing their temperature with radiation sensors through infrared transmissive fibers. This permits all degrees of freedom for the design of the heater for optimum frequency response. In the present design the sensitivity is quite small. With a temperature of the heater 100 K above ambient, only 5 μW heats up the black spot target of the radiation sensor, resulting in an output voltage of 1.5 mV. The standard deviation of the mean of an AC-DC voltage transfer involving 12 measurements is approximately 20×10^-6 to 50×10^-6