Abstract Laterally biased quantum-well infrared photodetectors (LBQWIPs) are expected to exhibit a photoresponse at room temperature. In these devices, the photocurrent is collected by means of two lateral Ohmic contacts on each side of an undoped quantum well (QW), which is coupled by tunneling to another n -doped QW. Photoexcited electrons from the n -doped QW tunnel through to the undoped QW and are swept out via a lateral bias voltage. Up to now, the practical development of these structures has not been yet achieved due to the difficulty of contacting single QWs separated by a few nanometers. In this paper, we report on a viable technology to fabricate LBQWIPs. We present two procedures to contact individual QWs, which are sufficiently close to be coupled by tunneling. The final devices exhibit very low dark-current values and clear infrared absorption peaks at 300 K, in good agreement with the results of numerical simulations. This work demonstrates the practical functionality of the laterally biased structure and paves the way for future developments of room temperature QWIPs.

中文翻译：

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用于量子阱红外光电探测器室温操作的横向偏置结构

摘要 横向偏置量子阱红外光电探测器 (LBQWIP) 有望在室温下表现出光响应。在这些器件中，光电流是通过未掺杂量子阱 (QW) 两侧的两个横向欧姆接触来收集的，该量子阱通过隧道耦合到另一个 n 掺杂 QW。来自 n 掺杂 QW 的光激发电子穿过未掺杂的 QW，并通过横向偏置电压被扫出。到目前为止，由于难以接触相隔几纳米的单个 QW，这些结构的实际开发尚未实现。在本文中，我们报告了一种制造 LBQWIP 的可行技术。我们提出了两个程序来接触单个 QW，它们足够接近以通过隧道耦合。最终器件在 300 K 处表现出非常低的暗电流值和清晰的红外吸收峰，与数值模拟结果非常吻合。这项工作展示了横向偏置结构的实用功能，并为未来室温 QWIP 的发展铺平了道路。