Germanium nanowire microbolometer

Near-infrared detection is widely used for nondestructive and non-contact inspections in various areas, including thermography, environmental and chemical analysis as well as food and medical diagnoses. Common room temperature bolometer-type infrared sensors are based on architectures in the mu m range, limiting miniaturization for future highly integrated 'More than Moore' concepts. In this work, we present a first principle study on a highly scalable and CMOS compatible bolometer-type detector utilizing Ge nanowires as the thermal sensitive element. For this approach, we implemented the Ge nanowires on top of a low thermal conducting and highly absorptive membrane as a near infrared (IR) sensor element. We adopted a freestanding membrane coated with an impedance matched platinum absorber demonstrating wavelength independent absorptivity of 50% in the near to mid IR regime. The electrical characteristics of the device were measured depending on temperature and biasing conditions. A strong dependence of the resistance on the temperature was shown with a maximum temperature coefficient of resistance of -0.07 K-1 at T = 100 K. Heat transport simulations using COMSOL were used to optimize the responsivity and temporal response, which are in good agreement with the experimental results. Further, lock-in measurements were used to benchmark the bolometer device at room temperature with respect to detectivity and noise equivalent power. Finally, we demonstrated that by operating the bolometer with a network of parallel nanowires, both detectivity and noise equivalent power can be effectively improved.