Abstract
We present results of 2D real-time imaging of terahertz (THz) beam generated by a photoconductive antenna driven by a femtosecond oscillator. The detector, operating at room temperature, is a 320 x 240 array of antenna-coupled microbolometers with integrated CMOS read-out electronics delivering 25 images per second. High quality images of broadband THz beams covering the 0.1-2 THz range are recorded while maintaining a signal-to-noise ratio of 10 for detected THz power as low as 25 nW. The compactness of the easy-to-use uncooled camera makes it very useful for the alignment of systems such as THz time-domain spectrometers and for the characterization of emitters, optics and other components.
Highlights
Terahertz (THz) imaging, initially developed for space applications such as radio astronomy, constitutes a promising technology for many large volume applications in various domains such as security, medicine, industrial quality control, art conservative studies, etc
We show that a camera integrating an array of THz optimized antenna-coupled microbolometers can be used to image the beam delivered by an optoelectronical THz time-domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS) set up
We used a 320 x 240 array of antenna-coupled microbolometers with integrated CMOS read-out electronics to characterize THz beams generated by a photoconductive antenna driven by a femtosecond laser oscillator
Summary
Terahertz (THz) imaging, initially developed for space applications such as radio astronomy, constitutes a promising technology for many large volume applications in various domains such as security, medicine, industrial quality control, art conservative studies, etc. Small arrays of superconducting pixels, mostly based on transition edge sensors, have been integrated on focal planes [4,5] Such cryogenic sensors comply with the very high sensitivity required for passive THz imaging but, because of their limited number of pixels, video output implies a fast opto-mechanical scanning of the scene of interest. Arrays of microbolometers [12,13,14,15] constitute certainly the best technical choice They exhibit a very good NEP – of the order of tens of pW–, include a large number of pixels (up to 8 × 104) and operate at video rate (20~30 fps).
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