Optimization of an infrared thermal mems-based microbolometer detector

Abstract

Abstract. This paper present a new n-well microbolometer structure (silicon well or n-type impurity) as active element that is obtained from every cmos standard process. Results of manufactured chips show that n-well layer have a TCR value about 0.5%/k. due to the heat flux into the microbolometer, temperature variation occurs within it that, as a consequence, leads to resistivity variation. Because microbolometer performance depends on the structure dimension, it has been tried to obtain optimized structure, precisely, by varying thermal simulation dimensions in ANSYS software. As a result, maximum specific detectivity has been determined equals to 1.391×10 9 cmHz 1/2 /W and responsivity as 3933.6 V/W. This economic method with appropriate performance is suitable for producing large focal plane arrays for uncooled infrared imaging.