Resonant cavity enhancement of polycrystalline PbTe films for IR detectors on Si-ROICs

Abstract

In this paper, we demonstrate high optical quantum efficiency (90%) resonant-cavity-enhanced mid-infrared photodetectors fabricated monolithically on a silicon platform. High quality photoconductive polycrystalline PbTe film is thermally evaporated, oxygen-sensitized at room temperature and acts as the infrared absorber. The cavity-enhanced detector operates in the critical coupling regime and shows a peak responsivity of 100 V/W at the resonant wavelength of 3.5 μm, 13.4 times higher compared to blanket PbTe film of the same thickness. Detectivity as high as 0.72 × 10 9 cmHz 1/2 W- 1 has been measured, comparable with commercial polycrystalline mid-infrared photodetectors. As low temperature processing ( < 160 °C) is implemented in the entire fabrication process, our detector is promising for monolithic integration with Si readout integrated circuits. © 2011 SPIE.