A new monolithic n-channel HgCdTe IRCCD array

Abstract

Monolithic n-channel infrared charge-coupled devices (IRCCDs) have been fabricated in Hg <inf xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">1-x</inf> Cd <inf xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">x</inf> Te ( <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">x \approx 0.3</tex> ). The first reported infrared detection and charge readout with such structures have been demonstrated. The CCD registers are four-phase, surface channel, overlapping gate structures incorporating MOS photodetectors which transfer laterally into the CCD shift register. The charge transfer efficiency (CTE) from a 2- element 3-1/2-bit IRCCD has been measured by electrical injection of signal using a fat zero input with <tex xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">CTE \geq 0.992</tex> being realized. The 2-element array and 20-element arrays with 20 bits have been operated in an optical detector multiplexing mode. Charge integration, transfer from the MOS detectors into the CCD register and serial readout have been demonstrated.