Generation of steady and jitter-free ultra-fast electrical pulses with GaAs photoconductive switches

Abstract

In this paper, experiments of a lateral semi-insulating GaAs photoconductive semiconductor switch triggered by nanosecond, pico-second and femto-second laser pulses were reported. The switches was insulated by solid multi-layer transparent dielectrics. Jitter-free electrical pulse with steady voltage amplitude from the 1mm-gap GaAs switches was observed when biased with a low voltage and triggered by the serial laser pulses. Its change of amplitude was less than 1.2%, the triggered jitter-time was less than 10ps, and pulse width was up to sub-nanosecond. The effect of pulse energy change on the amplitude generated photoconductive semiconductor switch was analyzed. It was indicated that ultra-fast electrical pulse with steady voltage amplitude and pico-second triggered jitter-time can be obtained by controlling switch trigger condition and optimizing the switch design.