Compact terahertz devices based on silicon in CMOS and BiCMOS technologies

Abstract

This paper reports on compact CMOS-based electronic sources and detectors developed for the terahertz frequency range. It was demonstrated that with the achievable noise-equivalent power levels in a few tens of pW/√Hz and the emitted power in the range of 100 µW, one can build effective quasi-optical emitter-detector pairs operating in the 200–266 GHz range with the input power-related signal-to-noise ratio reaching 70 dB for 1 Hz-equivalent noise bandwidth. The applicability of these compact devices for a variety of applications including imaging, spectroscopy or wireless communication links was also demonstrated.