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by Technology Explained Date Added: Monday 06 February, 2012Silicon photodiode is made from a single crystal Si wafer. The band gap of silicon fits in the energy level from visible light wavelengths to near infrared (400~1100nm). The photodiode is suitable to detect lights in that wavelength range.
The responsivity of a photodiode indicates how sensitive of the diode to the incident light. It is measured in photocurrent in amperes against the optical power on the diode in watts. Responsivity of the silicon photodiode is lower than that of the InGaAs photodiode used in 1100~1650nm range. Typically silicon diode has lower than 0.5A/W responsivity.
Higher responsivity can be achieved by having bigger active detector area, which has more photodetector units. However, larger detector area also increases the capacitance of the diode, and hence reduce its response time.
Si photodiode is highly linear device, under reverse bias voltage. Within the saturation optical power, the current generated from the diode is extremely linear against the input optical power. This feature makes it a suitable detector unit for optical power meters. The power meter measures the optical power based on the current generated from the photodiode, which can be measured very accurately.
When designing an optical signal detector, the noise, rise time, response spectrum, temperature effects, etc. are all important factors to consider.Rating: [5 of 5 Stars!]Our Offers
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