Absorption enhancement in a thin HgCdTe (MCT) layer

What is it about?

Mercury-cadmium-telluride (MCT) based infrared photodetectors (IR PDs) require bulky and costly cryogenic cooling to reduce noise and maintain a good signal-to-noise ratio. Noise can be reduced by reducing the MCT layer thickness without affecting absorption efficiency and photocarrier generation. In our proposed scheme, we integrate resonant dielectric grating (RWG) with a thin (1.5 µm) MCT absorbing layer to enhance absorption and photocarrier generation that is comparable to a bulk 5 µm thick MCT layer without RWG. A ~3x reduction in the MCT layer thickness without compromising the absorption has the potential for realizing infrared (IR) photodetectors (PDs) with improved sensitivity at conventional and/or elevated operating temperatures.

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Photo by ZENG YILI on Unsplash

Photo by ZENG YILI on Unsplash