Lotfi, Hossein; Li, Lu; Lei, Lin; Yang, Rui Q.; Klem, John F.; Johnson, Matthew B.
We report on the characterization of narrow-bandgap (Eg ≈ 0.4 eV, at 300 K) interband cascade thermophotovoltaic (TPV) devices with InAs/GaSb/AlSb type-II superlattice absorbers. Two device structures with different numbers of stages (two and three) were designed and grown to study the influence of the number of stages and absorber thicknesses on the device performance at high temperatures (300-340 K). Maximum power efficiencies of 9.6% and 6.5% with open-circuit voltages of 800 and 530 mV were achieved in the three- and two-stage devices at 300 K, respectively. These results validate the benefits of a multiple-stage architecture with thin individual absorbers for efficient conversion of infrared radiation into electricity from low-temperature heat sources. Additionally, we developed an effective characterization method, based on an adapted version of Suns-Voc technique, to extract the device series and shunt resistance in these TPV cells.
High-quality infrared focal plane arrays (FPAs) are used in many satellite, astronomical, and terrestrial applications. These applications require highly-sensitive, low-noise FPAs, and therefore do not benefit from advances made in low-cost thermal imagers where reducing cost and enabling high-temperature operation drive device development. Infrared detectors used in FPAs have been made for decades from alloys of mercury cadmium telluride (MCT). These infrared detectors are nearing the believed limit of their performance. This limit, known in the infrared detector community as Rule 07, dictates the dark current floor for MCT detectors, in their traditional architecture, for a given temperature and cutoff wavelength. To overcome the bounds imposed by Rule 07, many groups are working on detector compounds other than MCT. We focus on detectors employing III-V-based gallium-free InAsSb superlattice active regions while also changing the basic architecture of the pixel to improve signal-to-noise. Our architecture relies on a resonant, metallic, subwavelength nanoantenna patterned on the absorber surface, in combination with a Fabry-Pérot cavity, to couple the incoming radiation into tightly confined modes near the nanoantenna. This confinement of the incident energy in a thin layer allows us to greatly reduce the volume of the absorbing layer to a fraction of the free-space wavelength, yielding a corresponding reduction in dark current from spontaneously generated electron-hole pairs in the absorber material. This architecture is detector material agnostic and could be applied to MCT detector structures as well, although we focus on using superlattice antimonide-based detector materials. This detector concept has been applied to both mid-wave (3-5 μm) and longwave (8-12 μm) infrared detectors and absorbers. Here we examine long-wave devices, as these detectors currently have a larger gap between desired device performance and that of currently existing detectors. The measured structures show an external quantum efficiency exceeding 50%. We present a comparison of the modeled and measured photoresponse of these detectors and compare these detectors to currently available commercial detectors using relevant metrics such as external quantum efficiency. We also discuss modeling of crosstalk between adjacent pixels and its influence on the potential for a dual-wavelength detector. Finally, we evaluate potential advances in these detectors that may occur in the near future.
We examined the spectral responsivity of a 1.77 μm thick type-II superlattice based long-wave infrared detector in combination with metallic nanoantennas. Coupling between the Fabry-Pérot cavity formed by the semiconductor layer and the resonant nanoantennas on its surface enables spectral selectivity, while also increasing peak quantum efficiency to over 50%. Electromagnetic simulations reveal that this high responsivity is a direct result of field-enhancement in the absorber layer, enabling significant absorption in spite of the absorber's subwavelength thickness. Notably, thinning of the absorbing material could ultimately yield lower photodetector noise through a reduction in dark current while improving photocarrier collection efficiency. The temperature- and incident-angle-independent spectral response observed in these devices allows for operation over a wide range of temperatures and optical systems. This detector paradigm demonstrates potential benefits to device performance with applications throughout the infrared.
The development of novel thermal sources that control the emission spectrum and the angular emission pattern is of fundamental importance. In this paper, we investigate the thermal emission properties of semiconductor hyperbolic metamaterials (SHMs). Our structure does not require the use of any periodic corrugation to provide monochromatic and directional emission properties. We show that these properties arise because of epsilon-near-zero conditions in SHMs. The thermal emission is dominated by the epsilon-near-zero effect in the doped quantum wells composing the SHM. Furthermore, different properties are observed for s and p polarizations, following the characteristics of the strong anisotropy of hyperbolic metamaterials.
A set of seven InAs/InAsSb type-II superlattices (T2SLs) were designed to have speci c bandgap energies between 290 meV (4.3 m) and 135 meV (9.2 m) in order to study the e ects of the T2SL bandgap energy on the minority carrier lifetime. A temperature dependent optical pump-probe technique is used to measure the carrier lifetimes, and the e ect of a mid-gap defect level on the carrier recombination dynamics is reported. The Shockley-Read-Hall (SRH) defect state is found to be at energy of approximately -250 12 meV relative to the valence band edge of bulk GaSb for the entire set of T2SL structures, even though the T2SL valence band edge shifts by 155 meV on the same scale. These results indicate that the SRH defect state in InAs/InAsSb T2SLs is singular and is nearly independent of the exact position of the T2SL bandgap or band edge energies. They also suggest the possibility of engineering the T2SL structure such that the SRH state is removed completely from the bandgap, a result that should signi cantly increase the minority carrier lifetime.
Flip-chip heterogeneously integrated n-p-n InGaP/GaAs heterojunction bipolar transistors (HBTs) with integrated thermal management on wide-bandgap AlN substrates followed by GaAs substrate removal are demonstrated. Without thermal management, substrate removal after integration significantly aggravates self-heating effects, causing poor $I$-$V$ characteristics due to excessive device self-heating. An electrothermal codesign scheme is demonstrated that involves simulation (design), thermal characterization, fabrication, and evaluation. Thermoreflectance thermal imaging, electrical-temperature sensitive parameter-based thermometry, and infrared thermography were utilized to assess the junction temperature rise in HBTs under diverse configurations. In order to reduce the thermal resistance of integrated devices, passive cooling schemes assisted by structural modification, i.e., positioning indium bump heat sinks between the devices and the carrier, were employed. By implementing thermal heat sinks in close proximity to the active region of flip-chip integrated HBTs, the junction-to-baseplate thermal resistance was reduced over a factor of two, as revealed by junction temperature measurements and improvement of electrical performance. The suggested heterogeneous integration method accounts for not only electrical but also thermal requirements providing insight into realization of advanced and robust III-V/Si heterogeneously integrated electronics.
Lotfi, Hossein; Li, Lu; Lei, Lin; Jiang, Yuchao; Yang, Rui Q.; Klem, John F.; Johnson, Matthew B.
High temperature operation (250-340 K) of short-wavelength interband cascade infrared photodetectors (ICIPs) with InAs/GaSb/Al0.2In0.8Sb/GaSb superlattice absorbers has been demonstrated with a 50% cutoff wavelength of 2.9 μm at 300 K. Two ICIP structures, one with two and the other with three stages, were designed and grown to explore this multiple-stage architecture. At λ = 2.1 μm, the two- and three-stage ICIPs had Johnson-noise-limited detectivities of 5.1 × 109 and 5.8 × 109cm Hz1/2/W, respectively, at 300 K. The better device performance of the three-stage ICIP over the two-stage ICIP confirmed the advantage of more stages for this cascade architecture. An Arrhenius activation energy of 450 meV is extracted for the bulk resistance-area product, which indicates the dominance of the diffusion current at these high temperatures.
Proceedings of SPIE - The International Society for Optical Engineering
Lotfi, Hossein; Li, Lu; Lei, Lin; Ye, Hao; Rassel, Sm S.; Jiang, Yuchao; Yang, Rui Q.; Klem, John F.; Mishima, Tetsuya D.; Santos, Michael B.; Johnson, Matthew B.; Gupta, James A.
We investigate high-temperature and high-frequency operation of interband cascade infrared photodetectors (ICIPs)-two critical properties. Short-wavelength ICIPs with a cutoff wavelength of 2.9 μm had Johnson-noise limited detectivity of 5.8×109 cmHz1/2/W at 300 K, comparable to the commercial Hg1-xCdxTe photodetectors of similar wavelengths. A simple but effective method to estimate the minority carrier diffusion length in short-wavelength ICIPs is introduced. Using this approach, the diffusion length was estimated to be significantly shorter than 1 μm at high temperatures, indicating the importance of a multiple-stage photodetector (e.g., ICIPs) at high temperatures. Recent investigations on the high-frequency operation of mid-wavelength ICIPs (λc=4.3 μm) are discussed. These photodetectors had 3-dB bandwidths up to 1.3 GHz with detectivities exceeding 1x109 cmHz1/2/W at room temperature. These results validate the ability of ICIPs to achieve high bandwidths with large sensitivity and demonstrate the great potential for applications such as: heterodyne detection, and free-space optical communication.
The Auger lifetime is a critical intrinsic parameter for infrared photodetectors as it determines the longest potential minority carrier lifetime and consequently the fundamental limitations to their performance. Here, Auger recombination is characterized in a long-wave infrared InAs/InAsSb type-II superlattice. Auger coefficients as small as 7.1 × 10 - 26 cm6/s are experimentally measured using carrier lifetime data at temperatures in the range of 20 K-80 K. The data are compared to Auger-1 coefficients predicted using a 14-band K · p electronic structure model and to coefficients calculated for HgCdTe of the same bandgap. The experimental superlattice Auger coefficients are found to be an order-of-magnitude smaller than HgCdTe.
Carrier lifetime and dark current measurements are reported for a mid-wavelength infrared InAs0.91Sb0.09 alloy nBn photodetector. Minority carrier lifetimes are measured using a non-contact time-resolved microwave technique on unprocessed portions of the nBn wafer and the Auger recombination Bloch function parameter is determined to be |F1F2|=0.292. The measured lifetimes are also used to calculate the expected diffusion dark current of the nBn devices and are compared with the experimental dark current measured in processed photodetector pixels from the same wafer. Excellent agreement is found between the two, highlighting the important relationship between lifetimes and diffusion currents in nBn photodetectors.
Epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) modes arising from condensed-matter excitations such as phonons and plasmons are a new path for tailoring light-matter interactions at the nanoscale. Complex spectral shaping can be achieved by creating such modes in nanoscale semiconductor layers and controlling their interaction with multiple, distinct, dipole resonant systems. Examples of this behavior are presented at midinfrared frequencies for ENZ modes that are strongly coupled to metamaterial resonators and simultaneously strongly coupled to semiconductor phonons or quantum-well intersubband transitions (ISTs), resulting in double- and triple-polariton branches in transmission spectra. For the double-polariton branch case, we find that the best strategy to maximize the Rabi splitting is to use a combination of a doped layer supporting an ENZ feature and a layer supporting ISTs, with overlapping ENZ and IST frequencies. This design flexibility renders this platform attractive for low-voltage tunable filters, light-emitting diodes, and efficient nonlinear composite materials.
Superconductivity in topological materials has attracted a great deal of interest in both electron physics and material sciences since the theoretical predictions that Majorana fermions can be realized in topological superconductors. Topological superconductivity could be realized in a type II, band-inverted, InAs/GaSb quantum well if it is in proximity to a conventional superconductor. Here, we report observations of the proximity effect induced giant supercurrent states in an InAs/GaSb bilayer system that is sandwiched between two superconducting tantalum electrodes to form a superconductor-InAs/GaSb-superconductor junction. Electron transport results show that the supercurrent states can be preserved in a surprisingly large temperature-magnetic field (T - H) parameter space. In addition, the evolution of differential resistance in T and H reveals an interesting superconducting gap structure.
We present that temperature-dependent measurements of carrier recombination rates using a time-resolved optical pump-probe technique are reported for mid-wave infrared InAs/InAs1-xSbx type-2 superlattices (T2SLs). By engineering the layer widths and alloy compositions, a 16 K band-gap of ~235 ± 10 meV was achieved for five unintentionally and four intentionally doped T2SLs. Carrier lifetimes were determined by fitting lifetime models based on Shockley-Read-Hall (SRH), radiative, and Auger recombination processes to the temperature and excess carrier density dependent data. The minority carrier (MC), radiative, and Auger lifetimes were observed to generally increase with increasing antimony content and decreasing layer thickness for the unintentionally doped T2SLs. The MC lifetime is limited by SRH processes at temperatures below 200 K in the unintentionally doped T2SLs. The extracted SRH defect energy levels were found to be near mid-bandgap. Additionally, it is observed that the MC lifetime is limited by Auger recombination in the intentionally doped T2SLs with doping levels greater than n ~1016 cm-3.
We have fabricated a superconductor (Ta)-InAs/GaSb bilayer-superconductor (Ta) junction device that has a long mean free path and can preserve the wavelike properties of particles (electrons and holes) inside the junction. Differential conductance measurements were carried out at low temperatures in this device, and McMillan-Rowell like oscillations (MROs) were observed. Surprisingly, a much larger Fermi velocity, compared to that from Shubnikov-de Haas oscillations, was obtained from the frequency of MROs. Possible mechanisms are discussed for this discrepancy.
We use cross-sectional scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) to reconstruct the monolayer-by-monolayer composition profile across a representative subset of MBE-grown InAs/InAsSb superlattice layers and find that antimony segregation frustrates the intended compositional discontinuities across both antimonide-on-arsenide and arsenide-on-antimonide heterojunctions. Graded, rather than abrupt, interfaces are formed in either case. We likewise find that the incorporated antimony per superlattice period varies measurably from beginning to end of the multilayer stack. Although the intended antimony discontinuities predict significant discrepancies with respect to the experimentally observed high-resolution x-ray diffraction spectrum, dynamical simulations based on the STM-derived profiles provide an excellent quantitative match to all important aspects of the x-ray data.
Coherent superposition of light from subwavelength sources is an attractive prospect for the manipulation of the direction, shape and polarization of optical beams. This phenomenon constitutes the basis of phased arrays, commonly used at microwave and radio frequencies. Here we propose a new concept for phased-array sources at infrared frequencies based on metamaterial nanocavities coupled to a highly nonlinear semiconductor heterostructure. Optical pumping of the nanocavity induces a localized, phase-locked, nonlinear resonant polarization that acts as a source feed for a higher-order resonance of the nanocavity. Varying the nanocavity design enables the production of beams with arbitrary shape and polarization. As an example, we demonstrate two second harmonic phased-array sources that perform two optical functions at the second harmonic wavelength (∼5μm): a beam splitter and a polarizing beam splitter. Proper design of the nanocavity and nonlinear heterostructure will enable such phased arrays to span most of the infrared spectrum.
Time-resolved measurements of carrier recombination are reported for a midwave infrared InAs/InAs0.66Sb0.34 type-II superlattice (T2SL) as a function of pump intensity and sample temperature. By including the T2SL doping level in the analysis, the Shockley-Read-Hall (SRH), radiative, and Auger recombination components of the carrier lifetime are uniquely distinguished at each temperature. SRH is the limiting recombination mechanism for excess carrier densities less than the doping level (the low-injection regime) and temperatures less than 175 K. A SRH defect energy of 95 meV, either below the T2SL conduction-band edge or above the T2SL valence-band edge, is identified. Auger recombination limits the carrier lifetimes for excess carrier densities greater than the doping level (the high-injection regime) for all temperatures tested. Additionally, at temperatures greater than 225 K, Auger recombination also limits the low-injection carrier lifetime due to the onset of the intrinsic temperature range and large intrinsic carrier densities. Radiative recombination is found to not have a significant contribution to the total lifetime for all temperatures and injection regimes, with the data implying a photon recycling factor of 15. Using the measured lifetime data, diffusion currents are calculated and compared to calculated Hg1-xCdxTe dark current, indicating that the T2SL can have a lower dark current with mitigation of the SRH defect states. These results illustrate the potential for InAs/InAs1-xSbx T2SLs as absorbers in infrared photodetectors.
Metallic nanocavities with deep subwavelength mode volumes can lead to dramatic changes in the behavior of emitters placed in their vicinity. This collocation and interaction often leads to strong coupling. Here, we present for the first time experimental evidence that the Rabi splitting is directly proportional to the electrostatic capacitance associated with the metallic nanocavity. The system analyzed consists of different metamaterial geometries with the same resonance wavelength coupled to intersubband transitions in quantum wells.
We present an electrodynamic model of strongly coupled metamaterial/intersubband-transition systems that can be used to predict and maximize Rabi splittings. This model can also be used to optimize metamaterial structures that enhance second-order nonlinear processes.
We present our recent electronic transport results in top-gated InAs/GaSb quantum well hybrid structures with superconducting Ta electrodes. We show that the transport across the InAs-Ta junction depends largely on the interfacial transparency, exhibiting distinct zero-bias behavior. For a relatively resistive interface, a broad conductance peak is observed at zero bias. When a transparent InAs-Ta interface is achieved, a zero-bias conductance dip appears with two coherent-peak-like features forming at bias voltages corresponding to the superconducting gap of Ta. The conductance spectra of the transparent InAs-Ta junction at different gate voltages can be fit well using the standard Blonder-Tinkham-Klapwijk theory.
The goal of this project is to search for Majorana fermions (a new quantum particle) in a topological superconductor (a new quantum matter achieved in a topological insulator proximitized by an s-wave superconductor). Majorana fermions (MFs) are electron-like particles that are their own anti-particles. MFs are shown to obey non-Abelian statistics and, thus, can be harnessed to make a fault-resistant topological quantum computer. With the arrival of topological insulators, novel schemes to create MFs have been proposed in hybrid systems by combining a topological insulator with a conventional superconductor. In this LDRD project, we will follow the theoretical proposals to search for MFs in one-dimensional (1D) topological superconductors. 1D topological superconductor will be created inside of a quantum point contact (with the metal pinch-off gates made of conventional s-wave superconductors such as niobium) in a two-dimensional topological insulator (such as inverted type-II InAs/GaSb heterostructure).
We utilize the unique dispersion properties of leaky plasmon polaritons in epsilon-near-zero (ENZ) thin films to demonstrate thermal radiation control. Owing to its highly flat dispersion above the light line, a thermally excited leaky wave at the ENZ frequency out-couples into free space without any scattering structures, resulting in a narrowband, wide-angle, p-polarized thermal emission spectrum. We demonstrate this idea by measuring angle- and polarization-resolved thermal emission spectra from a single layer of unpatterned, doped semiconductors with deep-subwavelength film thickness (d / λ 0 ∼ 6 × 10 - 3, where d is the film thickness and λ 0 is the free space wavelength). We show that this semiconductor ENZ film effectively works as a leaky wave thermal radiation antenna, which generates far-field radiation from a thermally excited mode. The use of semiconductors makes the radiation frequency highly tunable by controlling doping densities and also facilitates device integration with other components. Therefore, this leaky plasmon polariton emission from semiconductor ENZ films provides an avenue for on-chip control of thermal radiation.