Photoconductive focal plane array based on HgTe quantum dots for fast and cost-effective short-wave infrared imaging.

HgTe nanocrystals, thanks to quantum confinement, present a broadly tunable band gap all over the infrared spectral range. In addition, significant efforts have been dedicated to the design of infrared sensors with an absorbing layer made of nanocrystals. However, most efforts have been focused on single pixel sensors. Nanocrystals offer an appealing alternative to epitaxially grown semiconductors for infrared imaging by reducing the material growth cost and easing the coupling to the readout circuit. Here we propose a strategy to design an infrared focal plane array from a single fabrication step. The focal plane array (FPA) relies on a specifically designed readout circuit enabling in plane electric field application and operation in photoconductive mode. We demonstrate a VGA format focal plane array with a 15 µm pixel pitch presenting an external quantum efficiency of 4-5% (15% internal quantum efficiency) for a cut-off around 1.8 µm and operation using Peltier cooling only. The FPA is compatible with 200 fps imaging full frame and imaging up to 340 fps is demonstrated by driving a reduced area of the FPA. In the last part of the paper, we discuss the cost of such sensors and show that the latter is only driven by labor costs while we estimate the cost of the NC film to be in the 10-20 € range.

HgTe Nanocrystals for SWIR Detection and Their Integration up to the Focal Plane Array.

Infrared applications remain too often a niche market due to their prohibitive cost. Nanocrystals offer an interesting alternative to reach cost disruption especially in the short-wave infrared (SWIR, λ < 1.7 µm) where material maturity is now high. Two families of materials are candidate for SWIR photoconduction: lead and mercury chalcogenides. Lead sulfide typically benefits from all the development made for a wider band gap such as the one made for solar cells, while HgTe takes advantage of the development relative to mid-wave infrared detectors. Here, we make a fair comparison of the two material detection properties in the SWIR and discuss the material stability. At such wavelengths, studies have been mostly focused on PbS rather than on HgTe, therefore we focus in the last part of the discussion on the effect of surface chemistry on the electronic spectrum of HgTe nanocrystals. We unveil that tuning the capping ligands is a viable strategy to adjust the material from the p-type to ambipolar. Finally, HgTe nanocrystals are integrated into multipixel devices to quantize spatial homogeneity and onto read-out circuits to obtain a fast and sensitive infrared laser beam profile.