Improvement of a point-contact detector performance using the terajet effect initiated by photonics

A simple millimeter wave and terahertz (THz) receiver scheme that uses subwave-length focusing of electromagnetic beam on the point-contact detector area with waveguide dimensions is studied. A detection system with such an optical coupling scheme is implemented, where the signal to be detected is coupled to a detector through a mesoscale dielectric particle lens based on terajet effect. We have experimentally demonstrated an enhancement of the point-contact detector sensitivity higher than 6 dB and with 1.5 times decreasing of the noise equivalent power value. The results show that the proposed method could be applied to reduce the size and increase the sensitivity of various THz systems, including imaging, which would enable significant progress in different fields such as physics, medicine, biology, astronomy, etc. (C) 2020 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE)

Automated summary

A simple scheme for a millimeter wave and terahertz receiver was studied, where electromagnetic beams were focused on the point-contact detector area with subwave-length. An optical coupling system was implemented using a mesoscale dielectric particle lens based on terajet effect to enhance the detector sensitivity and decrease noise equivalent power value. The proposed method could significantly reduce the size and increase the sensitivity of various THz systems, with potential applications in fields like physics, medicine, biology, and astronomy.