Surface plasmon waveguide Schottky detectors operating near breakdown

Surface plasmon waveguide Schottky detectors were investigated experimentally at room temperature near junction breakdown. The detectors consist of an Au stripe on n-Si forming a Schottky contact thereon and supporting strongly confined surface plasmons localised at the Au/Si interface. The detectors were excited by end-fire coupling at lambda(0) = 1310 nm where the detection mechanism is the internal photoelectric effect. A similar to 10x increase in responsivity was measured at strong reverse biases compared to no bias due to plasmon-induced junction breakdown. A maximum responsivity of 2.35 mA/W is reported. [GRAPHICS] Surface plasmon waveguide Schottky detector (C) 2010 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim