Chaos in photovoltaic HgCdTe detectors under laser irradiation

Chaos in photovoltaic HgCdTe detectors irradiated by a low-power stable continuous-wave laser is found in our experiment. The detectors give a chaotic output in the laser irradiation power density range a little higher than their saturation threshold. Chaos is diagnosed by calculating the power spectrum and the Lyapunov exponent with experimental data of the detectors’ output signals vs. time. We conclude with a qualitative discussion of the possible causes of the observed chaotic behavior. Received: 3 April 2002 / Revised version: 8 July 2002 / Published online: 25 October 2002 RID="*" ID="*"Corresponding author. (Fax: +86-0731/4514127, E-mail: maliqin01@263.net)