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Efficient electrical detection of mid-infrared graphene plasmons at room temperature

Nature Materials volume 17, pages 986–992 (2018)Cite this article

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An Author Correction to this article was published on 10 September 2018

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Abstract

Optical excitation and subsequent decay of graphene plasmons can produce a significant increase in charge-carrier temperature. An efficient method to convert this temperature elevation into electrical signals can enable important mid-infrared applications. However, the modest thermoelectric coefficient and weak temperature dependence of carrier transport in graphene hinder this goal. Here, we demonstrate mid-infrared graphene detectors consisting of arrays of plasmonic resonators interconnected by quasi-one-dimensional nanoribbons. Localized barriers associated with disorder in the nanoribbons produce a dramatic temperature dependence of carrier transport, thus enabling the electrical detection of plasmon decay in the nearby graphene resonators. Our device has a subwavelength footprint of 5 × 5 μm2 and operates at 12.2 μm with an external responsivity of 16 mA W–1 and a low noise-equivalent power of 1.3 nW Hz–1/2 at room temperature. It is fabricated using large-scale graphene and possesses a simple two-terminal geometry, representing an essential step towards the realization of an on-chip graphene mid-infrared detector array.

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Fig. 1: Device design and operation principle.
Fig. 2: Temperature dependence of carrier transport and photocurrent generation.
Fig. 3: Device scalability and effect of Joule electron heating on the responsivity.
Fig. 4: Frequency response and noise characteristics.

Change history

  • 10 September 2018

    In the version of this Article originally published, the units of the right-hand y axis of Fig. 2a were incorrectly labelled as mS; they should have been µS. Also, the x-axis tick marks of Fig. 3b should have been aligned with Fig. 3a,c. These have now been corrected.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the National Science Foundation (CAREER Award ECCS-1552461) for financial support. We also thank the Office of Naval Research (N00014-14-1-0565) for partial support in the photocurrent measurement set-up. We thank X. Li and J. Kong for providing some of the monolayer graphene on copper for this project and IBM Research for providing DLC on silicon substrates. F.J.G.d.A. and R.Y. acknowledge support from the Spanish MINECO (MAT2017-88492-R and SEV2015-0522), the European Commission (Graphene Flagship 696656) and Fundació Privada Cellex.

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Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Qiushi Guo, Renwen Yu

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Electrical Engineering, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA

    Qiushi Guo, Cheng Li, Shaofan Yuan, Bingchen Deng & Fengnian Xia

  2. ICFO-Institut de Ciencies Fotoniques, The Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology, Barcelona, Spain

    Renwen Yu & F. Javier García de Abajo

  3. Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ICREA), Barcelona, Spain

    F. Javier García de Abajo

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  1. Qiushi Guo
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Contributions

Q.G. and F.X. conceived the project. Q.G. fabricated the devices and performed the measurements with help from C.L. S.Y. and B.D. Theoretical modelling and data analysis were carried out by R.Y. under the supervision of F.J.G.d.A. All the authors discussed the results and commented on the manuscript.

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Correspondence to F. Javier García de Abajo or Fengnian Xia.

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Supplementary Notes 1–7, Supplementary Figures 1–9, Supplementary References 1–29

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Guo, Q., Yu, R., Li, C. et al. Efficient electrical detection of mid-infrared graphene plasmons at room temperature. Nature Mater 17, 986–992 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-018-0157-7

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