Noise characteristics of quantum-well infrared photodetectors at low temperatures

作者：Jie Yao, Daniel C. Tsui, K. K. Choi · 发表于：Applied Physics Letters · 年份：2000 · DOI：10.1063/1.125703 · 被引用次数：6 · 研究领域：Advanced Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics、Semiconductor Quantum Structures and Devices、Quantum and electron transport phenomena

In this work, we have performed high-sensitivity measurements on the dark current and the noise current of infrared hot-electron transistors (IHETs) and their constituent quantum-well infrared photodetectors (QWIPs) at 4.2 K. We found that the dominant noise of the QWIPs in this regime is not from the expected shot noise but from the 1/f noise and possibly a bias-independent noise. Part of the 1/f noise is unrelated to impurities in the barrier and is intrinsic to the sequential tunneling mechanism in QWIPs. By filtering out the impurity-assisted tunneling current, the IHETs reduce the dark current and the 1/f noise, and improve the detector sensitivity and uniformity.