Nanometer thin-film Ni-NiO-Ni diodes for 30 THz radiation

We report on the development of antenna-coupled thin-film nanometer Ni-NiO-Ni diodes which are used to detect 10.6 m CO₂-laser radiation. The Ni-NiO-Ni diodes have a minimum contact area of 0.056 m². This is smaller than those of any previously fabricated thin-film Metal-metalOxide-Metal (MOM) diodes. By measuring the second derivative of the dc current-voltage characteristics I(V), we demonstrate that the nonlinearity of the dc I(V) characteristics of our Ni-NiO-Ni diodes is larger than that of the dc I(V) characteristics of thin-film MOM diodes fabricated before by other authors. It is comparable to the nonlinearity of the dc I(V) characteristics of point-contact MOM diodes. Furthermore, we show that the polarisation-dependent infrared response of the Ni-NiO-Ni diodes is due to antenna coupling and that the polarisation-independent response is mainly of thermal origin. Consequently, the heating of the Ni-NiO-Ni diodes is due to the absorption of the incident CO₂-laser radiation in the SiO₂, and dissipation of the laser-induced ac antenna currents in the antenna.