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Development of high-speed, low-noise NIR HgCdTe avalanche photodiode arrays for adaptive optics and interferometry
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2010
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EngineeringOptical TestingInfrared Ao SensorsInterferometryIntegrated CircuitsAvalanche GainImage SensorOptical PropertiesInfrared OpticComputational ImagingInstrumentationRadiation ImagingPhotonicsCmos Noise BarrierAdaptive OpticInfrared SensorOptical Information ProcessingAdaptive OpticsOptical EngineeringOptoelectronics
The most promising way to overcome the CMOS noise barrier of infrared AO sensors is the amplification of the photoelectron signal directly at the point of absorption inside the infrared pixel by means of the avalanche gain. HgCdTe eAPD arrays with cut off wavelengths of λ<sub>c</sub> ~2.64 μm produced by SELEX-Galileo have been evaluated at ESO. The arrays were hybridized to an existing non-optimized ROIC developed for laser gated imaging which has a format of 320×256 pixels and four parallel video outputs. The avalanche gain makes it possible to reduce the read noise to < 7 e rms. The dark current requirements of IR wavefront sensing are also met.