High‐power RF photodiodes and their applications

Abstract

Abstract There has been an increasing interest in photonic generation of RF signals in the millimeter‐wave (30 GHz∼300 GHz) and/or terahertz‐wave (0.1 THz∼10 THz) regions, and photodiodes play a key role in it. This paper reviews recent progress in the high‐power RF photodiodes such as Uni‐Traveling‐Carrier‐Photodiodes (UTC‐PDs), which operate at these frequencies. Several approaches to increasing both the bandwidth and output power of photodiodes are discussed, and promising applications to broadband wireless communications and spectroscopic sensing are described.