High-speed and low-noise avalanche photodiode operating at 1.06 /spl mu/m

Abstract

Previously, it has been demonstrated that resonant-cavity-enhanced, quantum-dot avalanche photodiodes can achieve a good gain and high quantum efficiency at 1.06 /spl mu/m. In our new effort, these devices have shown RC-limited bandwidths of 35 GHz at low gain and gain-bandwidth products as high as 220 GHz. The achievable gain has been increased from /spl sim/18 to greater than 50 while keeping the quantum efficiency high. These photodiodes also exhibited low avalanche noise (k=0.24), low dark current (less than 100 nA at 90% of the breakdown voltage), and low-breakdown voltage (/spl sim/17 V).