High speed InAs electron avalanche photodiodes overcome the conventional gain-bandwidth product limit

• Main Authors: Marshall, A.R.J., Ker, P.J., Krysa, A., David, J.P.R., Tan, C.H.
• Format: Article
• Language: en_US
• Published: 2017

High bandwidth, uncooled, Indium Arsenide (InAs) electron avalanche photodiodes (e-APDs) with unique and highly desirable characteristics are reported. The e-APDs exhibit a 3dB bandwidth of 3.5 GHz which, unlike that of conventional APDs, is shown not to reduce with increasing avalanche gain. Hence these InAs e-APDs demonstrate a characteristic of theoretically ideal electron only APDs, the absence of a gain-bandwidth product limit. This is important because gain-bandwidth products restrict the maximum exploitable gain in all conventional high bandwidth APDs. Non-limiting gain-bandwidth products up to 580 GHz have been measured on these first high bandwidth e-APDs. © 2011 Optical Society of America.