High-Sensitivity and Broadband, Real-Time Terahertz Camera Incorporating a Micro-Bolometer Array With Resonant Cavity Structure

• Published in: IEEE transactions on terahertz science and technology Vol. 6; no. 2; pp. 175 - 182
• Main Authors: Nemoto, Natsuki, Kanda, Natsuki, Imai, Ryo, Konishi, Kuniaki, Miyoshi, Masaru, Kurashina, Seiji, Sasaki, Tokuhito, Oda, Naoki, Kuwata-Gonokami, Makoto
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Piscataway IEEE 01.03.2016; The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc. (IEEE)
• Subjects: Arrays; Cameras; Cavity resonators; Compact terahertz camera; Detectors; Electrons; focal plane array; Frequency ranges; Holes; Imaging; Inspection; micro-bolometer; Nondestructive testing; Real time; real-time imaging; Real-time systems; Sensitivity; Sensors; Silicon compounds; terahertz (THz)
• ISSN: 2156-342X; 2156-3446
• DOI: 10.1109/TTHZ.2015.2508010

Terahertz (THz) cameras comprising an uncooled micro-bolometer array have been developed for simple THz imaging, and the improvement of their sensitivity is one of the important issues. We fabricated a new micro-bolometer array with a resonant cavity structure for a real-time THz camera, alongside a new method for evaluating the sensitivity across a wide range of the THz frequency region. The frequency dependence of the sensitivity of the THz camera is measured in the 0.5-2.0-THz frequency range taking the polarization dependence into account. It was found that the resonant cavity structure effectively increased the sensitivity of the THz camera, and, actually, the improvement by one order of magnitude was achieved in the frequency range below 1 THz. The THz camera with much enhanced sensitivity will expand the frontiers of real-time THz imaging such as molecular imaging and nondestructive inspection.