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Microelectronics Technology and Devices (SBMicro), 2014 29th Symposium on

Conference Paper · August 2014

DOI: 10.1109/SBMicro.2014.6940098

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 Precision and accuracy in the measurements of
responsivity
Tiago G. Santos \ M. F. Mendonya , R. c. Lopes , C. A. Delfin0 , G. s. Vieira ,
2 2 2 l2
l
rnstituto Tecnol6gico de Aeronautica - ITA - Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil.
2
Instituto de Estudos Avanyados - IEAv - Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil.
gvieira @ieav.cta.hr

Abstract- In this work we discuss some error sources in the
determination of infrared sensors responsivity, identifying,
quantifying and, when possible, proposing ways of minimize
them. The errors may happen on the reading of electrical signal,
or on the illumination of the sensor under test. When reading the
electric signal, noise may be read as signal, even when using a
lock in amplifier, and also signal intensity may be lost on the
electric cables and connections, before reaching
amplifier. During illumination of the sensor, geometrical
distortions, unplanned reflections, radiation partial obstruction
and atmospheric absorption can make the calculated signal
intensity unreal, even if the source itself is a very good one.
Keywords-responsivity; infrared sensor; lock-in; blackbody;
chopper
I. INTRODUCTION
Photodetectors are devices whose operation is based on the
transduction of optical signal into electrical signal [1]. When
radiation reaches the photodetector,voltage or electric current
are generated in the device [2]. Infrared photodetectors are of
great interest in many areas. For example,infrared images are
used to detect toxic components in gas mixtures, what is of
great importance for monitoring installations in chemical
industry, besides mining and oil companies. Thermal images
help identifying maintenance needs in industrial facilities and
problems in transmission lines of electric power. Infrared
images also are important for medical applications, for
example, it helps the evaluation of eyes lubrication or the
identification of skin cancer occurrence. This vast amount of
technological applications, besides the military interest, has
single point measurement, but, if it is done, the calculated
radiation intensity reaching the sensor may be different from
the real one, for many different reasons, and it will not be
possible to even correctly estimate the error bar. Besides
having the real radiation intensity different from the calculated
one, electromagnetic interference or electrical noise, may
generate incorrect reading of sensor signal, specially, when
the pre­
measuring small devices. Other sources of error are the cables
and connections signal loss. It is, then, important to establish
methodologies and guide lines for ensuring reliable
determination of sensors responsivity. It is the main goal of
this paper.
II. METHODOLOGY AND PROCEDURE
A. Measuring equipment
Our experimental apparatus for integral responsivity
measurement is composed of a lock-in amplifier, Signal
Recovery 7265; a Janis cryostat lOO/204 with 7 k closed cycle
refrigerator, placed in an optical table with damping system;
and CI Systems cavity black body SR 200 source with
chopper system attached. The cryostat has electrical
connections to the lock-in and the temperature controller, and
connections to the vacuum pump and the helium compressors
that are made by metal bellows hoses. The setup for this
system is showed in fig. 1. For preventing radiative
electromagnetic interference, all cables conducting signal are
of coaxial type. Only inside the metallic cryostat single wires
were used.
Teml)('ralur(' coni roller

generated great efforts for the continuous development of

many kinds of such devices [1,2].
The quality of these sensors is quantified by their figures
of merit, being responsivity an important one. It is defined as
the ratio of the rms value of the light genarated electrical
output signal from the detector and the rms value of the
radiation incident power on the effective area of the device
[3]. Although it seems to be a very simple measurement,when
someone starts to make them, he will soon find out
reproducibility problems, what puts in question its reliability.
Those reproducibility problems may be found when making
the experiment in what seems to be the same conditions,or in Fig. 1. Experimental apparatus utilized for integral responsivity
measurements.
a different condition, but that should, in principle, give the
same results.
B. Analysis afthe limits afthe electrical signal
Integral responsivity, i.e., the responsivity measured using measurements
a black body as source of light (as opposite to spectral When measuring an isolated sensor, usually a lock-in
responsivity that is the responsivity measured against amplifier is used. Although it has a high noise rejection,it may
monochromatic light), can, in principle, be determined in a

978-1-4799-4696-9/14/$31.00 ©2014 IEEE

give wrong results when measuring very low signal immersed
in a high noise level. Besides the sensor noise itself, this high
noise may come from the setup or it may be electromagnetic
interference coming from sources outside the setup. In order to
reproduce similar conditions of some samples measured, a
resistor of 10.0 MQ was inserted into the cryostat and
connected the same way a two terminal sensor would be. The
cryostat is used here because many infrared sensors need to be
refrigerated down to cryogenic temperatures. A small voltage
•
signal was applied to the resistor using the oscillator of a lock­
in and a voltage divider with a factor of 10 3 Another lock-in
amplifier was used for current measurements using the
following settings: float mode,automatic gain,current in Low
Noise or wide BandWidth mode, external reference mode,
time constant equal to 1 s, and reference frequency of 40 or
500 Hz. The oscillator voltage (rms) was ramped from 1 IlV to
80 mV and a liner fit was done for the higher voltage values
on the resulting current versus voltage, I-V, curves. At low
current values the curves become nonlinear indicating reading
error (Fig. 2). The measured current values oscillate around a
constant value to very low bias, showing a current back
ground. It was found, and could be expected,that this current
back ground changes with the intensity of non-synchronal
signals (noise). It is important to note that the observed back
ground is many orders of magnitude higher than the
equipment measuring limit,which only can be reached at very
special conditions (very low noise setup).
The measurements described above were done with most
of the equipment, normally used in the setup for sensor
characterization,off. As show in Fig. 1,some other equipment
is used for responsivity measurement, and each one of them
will introduce interfering signals on the system. For measuring
the interference of each piece of equipment on the current
signal read in the lock-in, the experiment was repeated for
each piece of equipment, individually, connected and turned
on,and with all of than on at once.
Since it was used a dual phase lock-in amplifier, each
measurement generates a (xi,yi) point which represents a
phasor of the measured signal. The average electrical current,
was calculated in two different ways: the average of phasor
modulus using (1) and the phasor modulus calculated from the
average of its components using (2). We called it scalar
average and vector average respectively.
Rscalar
=
Jxf + yf (1)
Rvector= ...J�
Xi + Yi (2)
For each voltage, the average was taken over 40
measurements with an interval of 1s. The two averages are
very close together for higher current levels, but give
significantly different results at lower current levels where
measured phase changes more.
C. Analazing the responsivity mesurement ofan infrared
photodetector
To explore the experimental limits in a real responsivity
measurement, photocurrent measurements were performed on
a PIN InGaAs photodiode,lattice matched to the InP substrate.
The mesa type photodiode was glued and wire bonded to a
header, which was fixed inside an optical cryostat. In this
experiment,five diodes of the same sample were used,but for
simplicity only one is showed here.
The black body was positioned at initial distance of
(40.2±0.3) cm from the sample, and the distance was
increased in steps of 10.0 cm until (120.2±0.3) cm. For each
distance, the black body aperture was varied using the
diameter values of 0.8,1.6,3.2,6.4,9.5,12.7,15.9,22.2 mm.
The power incident on the sample was calculated for each
position and aperture of the black body using (3).
peWRMS
) =
( crFIn T(T
J BB )4Abb ) *
Ad ( 3)
nd2
Where (J is the sthefan-Boltzman constant, Fm is the
modulation factor for mechanical chopper, � is the
transmission coefficient of the ZnSe window, Tss is the black
body temperature,Ass is the area of the aperture of the black
body, d is the distance between the black body aperture and
the sample,and Ad is the effective area of the detector.
With the calculated power,the curves of photocurrent as a
function of power intensity on the sample were drawn for each
distance. The idea of separating different distances is that
those curves should show a linear behavior even with a
significant error on the distance measurement, since they will
be affected equally. Also any effect coming from atmospheric
absorptions would affect equally all points of given curve. It
can be expected that, at a distance far enough, the curve will
not be linear due to the signal being too small.
The lock-in configurations used here were: Float mode,
gain in automatic mode, current in low noise or wide
bandwidth mode, external reference from the chopper, time
constant of Is, temperature of the black body in 1273 K,
chopper frequency at 40 or 500 Hz,and chopper wheel of 8 or
2 blades.
III. RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
Fig. 2 shows lock-in measured I-V curves of the 10.0 MQ
resistor put inside the cryostat. The reference frequency was
40 Hz and the measurements were performed with the resistor
at room temperature. No other equipment of the setup was
connected or turned on. For currents above 0.5 pA a clearly
ohmic behavior is seen, but it becomes nonlinear at the lower
currents (inset Fig. 2). The curve with filled squares refers to
the scalar average, the one with filled triangles is the vector
average and the half-filled circles show the ohmic behavior
expected. The dash line curve is a fit of the experimental
points, and its inclination, shown in the figure, is slightly
above the nominal value of the resistor. Curve with star points
indicate the noise level measured in the lock-in (right axis).
The measurements shown in Fig. 3 were done at the same
configurations of the measurements in Fig. 2,but now,with all
equipment necessary for measuring responsivity (Fig. 1)
connected and turned on. It is possible to notice that standard
deviation has increased, but the curve still have a linear
behavior at higher current. At lower current level, however, The wide bandwidth mode allows working in higher
the measured values are systematically above the line set by frequencies at the penalty of lower noise rejection. It is not
the higher current measurements. It also can be seen in Fig. 2, expect to attenuate the signal at 500 Hz, but a difference is
but here it happens for higher current values. It also can be seen from the readings at 40 Hz. It can be explained by
seen that the scalar and vector average are quite different at capacitive current leak on the cables inside and outside the
this current level,with the vector average giving better results. cryostat.
Another point to be noted is that the noise average measured
Standard deviation of scalar average with klck-in in wtde BandWidth
by the lock-in is higher than in Fig. 2.
(40 Hz)
3,0
Lock"'n ... Cryostat
40Hz, wide bandwidth, Gain 40 dB on, 1uV·80mV (10.0 MO) 2.B Lock-in ... Cryostat ... Black body (40 Hz)
2.6 Lock-in ... Cryostat ... vacuum pump (40 Hz)
-.- Current scalar average • lock-in + Cryostat + + Black body + vacuum pump (40 Hz)
8 - A- Cu r r en t vector average
2,4 • lock-in'" Cryostat ...... Black body ... vacuum pump'" He Compressor (40 Hz)
Ohmic behavior expected � 2,2 • lock-in + Cryostat + + Black body + vacuum pump + He Compressor (500 Hz)
Cryostat + He Compressor (500 Hz)
•

Noise average in the lock4in

.. lock-in + + Black body + vacuum pump +
2,0
c
�

0 1.B
."
h �
'5 1,6
Q) .
-a.
�5 'C 1,4
.
. .. ..
c � 1,2
Q)
t: 4 -g 1,0
:::>
u

.�
u 3
...m�"
Q.OI
�
3l 0,8

0,6

� 2
200m

� 00

0000 0002 00001 oooe

o o 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 60 90

Voltage in signal source (mV.MS)

o 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
Voltage after potential divider (IlVRM
Fig. 4. Standard deviation of the current scalar average in wide bandwidth
S)
mode, for all configurations tested.

Fig. 2. Curves of ac current versus voltage, considering: scalar average

(filled square) and vector average (filled triangle). The Ohmic expected In these experiments, it was possible to notice that the
behavior is also shown (half-filled circle). The measurements were performed equipment piece generating the highest interference is the
with the lock-in in wide bandwidth mode. The star points indicates the helium compressor, but the noise coupled did not affect
average noise measured with the lock-in. significantly measurements of current above 1 pA, even with
the lock-in set to wide bandwidth mode,that gives lower noise
40Hz, wide bandwidth, Gain30dB on, 1 �V·80mV (10MO) + black body +
gV m m +H mr
rejection. The photocurrent versus incident power curves were
8 -a- Current scalar average
expected to show a linear behavior for fixed distance. It was
....... .- Current vector average not the found for the first measurements, even for small
7
Ohmic behavior expected
Noise average in the lock-in distances. Since the alignment of the system was carefully
�6 checked with laser leveling equipment, reflections are the
«rr. 5 most probable cause of the unexpected behavior. A major
.e
C 4 source of reflection is, of course, the black body table. For
� 3 blocking this reflection and others,two blocking devices were
:;
u
2
employed,a planar barrier and an optical iris.
u
�Q) 1 100 Diode number 8 the sample, Tn = 1273 K, 40 Hz, blades in chopper = 2,
W reflected radiation
0
bloc ked

.
-1 ..* **,-. * .. . *.* *.
• .. . .......
.. .. Jt.Ju.it * .
.. ....... ••.** • ..•
'*

.. .. ..,.. .,. ..--. '7"tIt

-2

·3
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 BO

Voltage after potential d ivid er (IlV RMS)

Fig. 3. Curves of ac current versus voltage considering: scalar average (filled

____ 40.2 em
square), vector average (filled traingle). The ohmic expected behavior (half­ ___ 502 em
filled circle) is also shwn. The measurements were performed in wide -A-60.2 em
--y- 70. 2 em
bandwidth mode. The star points show the noise average measured by the -+-80_2 em
...... 90.2 em
lock-in, with whole equipment connected and turned on. ____ 100 2 em
-'-110_2em

0 .1 +-�rrnTn- --r-��Tn.--'-'-rTr�---r��
�'��
n·�
2 '�
m
Fig. 4 and 5 show the standard deviations for all lE-9 lE-8 l E -7
measurements performed in this test with the lock-in in low Incident Power (WRMS)
noise and wide bandwidth mode respectively. Although the
low noise mode gives better results for 40 Hz,it is expected to Fig. 5. This serie of curves shows the measurement of an InGaAs photodiode
attenuate the signal at 500 Hz (a 3 dB attenuation is expected). with black body at 1273 K, and chopper frequency at 40 Hz, with a barrier for
preventing the black body radiation reflections from reaching the sample.
 The photocurrent measured in an InGaAs photodiode, at
room temperature, using the reflection blocking devices, as a
function of incident power is shown in the Fig. 6. The incident
power has been varied by changing the black body aperture
and the distance between sample and black body. The black
body temperature was 1273 K.
At any set up, it is necessary to make the responsivity
measurements at many black body's apertures and distances
from the sample in order to be sure all the important reflected
rays were really blocked.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The curves at each distance show a linear behavior for The authors acknowledges CNPq, FINEP (Fundos
most of the distances, showing some nonlinearity for the Setoriais),MCT,CNPq,FAPERJ and CAPES for the financial
largest distances and smallest apertures. It indicates that most support to do this work. This work received support from
reflections have been taken way, and that the electrical INCT-DISSE.
measuring limit is approaching at the smallest power REFERENCES
intensities. Making a liner fit to the linear part of each curve
[I] S. D. Gunapala, Quantum well infrared photodetector research and
and plotting it as a function of distance, Fig. 7, the calculated
development at Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Infrared Science and
responsivity shows unexpected variations. A small decrease in Technology, vol. 42, pp. 267-282, 200 I.
calculated responsivity with increasing distance can be [2] A Rogalski, Infrared detectors for the future. Acta Physica Polonica A,
expected, since atmospheric absorption is not taken into vol. 116 p. 389, 2009.
account on the power calculation,but the variation found goes [3] 1. D. Vincent, Fundamentals of infrared detector operation and testing.
beyond that. The variation found indicates that, although the New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1990.
reflection problem has been attenuated, it still affects [4] R. D. Hudson Jr., Infrared system engineering. New York: John Wiley
significantly the results,and new actions are needed. and Sons Inc., 1969.

0.21 Diode 8, angular Inclination, T.= 1273 K.

0.20 •

I'"

�:::J 0.19 •
u
'0 •
c •
• • •

.\
.2 • T

"' 0.18 ·------ �ili-�I-

.!:
13
E
iii
iii
'3 0.17
0>
c
•
<
-__ Ins and barnar blached
• Iris bloched
0.16
40 60 80 100 120

Distance between black body and sample (cm)

T Slopes of the lines for each distance between the sample and the black body
(TBB = 1273 K) behavior at 40 Hz. filled circle points, optical iris blocking
reflected radiations. filled square points, optical iris and planar barrier
blocking reflected radiations.

IV. CONCLUSIONS

Some important error sources on responslvlty

measurement were identified and quantified. It gives
information about the limits for reliable measurements and
indicates possible ways of improving then. In particular,some
additional actions for blocking reflections are needed and
others for reducing electromagnetic interference are also
beneficial.
The results show that measurements made in situations
where signal is too small related to noise level are not reliable,
even made with lock in amplifiers and large integration times.
It is necessary to vary the incidence power, including the
radiation completely blocked, for having reliable results. If it
is not possible to increase the incident power to levels that
would give more reliable results, make the average on the
phasor components rater than its modulus is beneficial.

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