The Impact Ionization MOSFET (IMOS) as low-voltage optical detector

Abstract

Avalanche photodiodes are widely used in a variety of applications. However, they need a high supply voltage. We propose to use the Impact Ionization MOSFET (IMOS) as an optical detector because it could substitute the high drain voltage by an internal amplification mechanism. Therefore, a much lower supply voltage would be needed. We fabricated devices as the first proof of principle and showed that the proposed concept works. We identified the most important problem of the actual devices and will do further research in order to improve the performance and reach towards the performance of avalanche photodiodes.