Date

2012

Author

Kutluer, Kutlu

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Detection of mid-wavelength infrared radiation is crucial for many industrial, military and biomedical applications. Photon detectors in the market can operate at only low temperature which increases weight, power consumption and total cost. Type-II InAs/GaSb superlattice infrared detectors are expected to have a major role in the infrared detector market with providing high quality detection characteristics at higher temperatures. Therefore, in the past decade, there has been an increasing interest in infrared detectors based on type-II InAs/GaSb superlattice technology due to their long range adjustable bandgap, low tunneling current and Auger recombination rates which bring potential of high temperature operation. Characterization of this photodiodes requires detailed investigations on different aspects. This study focuses on various optical and electrical characterization techniques for single pixel infrared detectors: responsivity characterization using FTIR and blackbody source, dark I-V and R-V characterizations, response time measurement. Characterizations of detector noise with respect to frequency and bias voltage are studied in detail. These characterization techniques are carried out in order to observe the effects of design with three different “standard” and a new “N” structure designs and also to understand the effects of surface passivation with atomic layer deposited Al2O3 layer and ordinary PECVD deposited Si3N4 and SiO2 layers. When standard photodiodes are compared, we observed that the one with the thickest active absorber region has the highest response and dark current density values. “N” structure design photodiode has very low dark current density while its optical performance is not as high as the standard designs. Si3N4 passivation degrades both optical and electrical performances. SiO2 and Al2O3 passivation layers improve optical and electrical characteristics of photodiodes. Theoretical and experimental dark current noise values of SiO2 passivated sample in agreement up to 0.18V reverse bias while those values of unpassivated and Si3N4 passivated samples agree only at zero bias. Temperature dependent R-V characteristics of photodiodes are analyzed and the surface limited activation energy is calculated in order to investigate the additional noise. At the end, surface recombination noise is proposed to cover the deficit on the noise calculation.

Subject Keywords

Infrared radiation., Superlattices as materials., Photon detectors.

URI

http://etd.lib.metu.edu.tr/upload/12614737/index.pdf
https://hdl.handle.net/11511/21945

Collections

Graduate School of Natural and Applied Sciences, Thesis