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Graphene field-effect transistors as room-temperature terahertz detectors

Nature Materials volume 11, pages 865–871 (2012)Cite this article

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Abstract

The unique optoelectronic properties of graphene make it an ideal platform for a variety of photonic applications1, including fast photodetectors2, transparent electrodes in displays and photovoltaic modules1,3, optical modulators4, plasmonic devices5, microcavities6, and ultra-fast lasers7. Owing to its high carrier mobility, gapless spectrum and frequency-independent absorption, graphene is a very promising material for the development of detectors and modulators operating in the terahertz region of the electromagnetic spectrum (wavelengths in the hundreds of micrometres), still severely lacking in terms of solid-state devices. Here we demonstrate terahertz detectors based on antenna-coupled graphene field-effect transistors. These exploit the nonlinear response to the oscillating radiation field at the gate electrode, with contributions of thermoelectric and photoconductive origin. We demonstrate room temperature operation at 0.3 THz, showing that our devices can already be used in realistic settings, enabling large-area, fast imaging of macroscopic samples.

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Figure 1: Antenna-coupled GFET-terahertz detector.
Figure 2: Device characteristics.
Figure 3: Responsivity.
Figure 4: NEP.
Figure 5: Fast, large-area, RT, terahertz imaging.

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Acknowledgements

We thank A. H. MacDonald, S. Roddaro and V. Piazza for very fruitful discussions. We acknowledge funding from MIUR-FIRB grant no. RBFR10M5BT and grant no. RBFR10LULP, MISE-ICE grant TERAGRAPH, GIS-TERALAB, GDR2987, GDR-I terahertz, the Region Languedoc-Roussillon, the ERC grant NANOPOTS, EU grants RODIN and GENIUS, a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award, EPSRC grants EP/GO30480/1 and EP/G042357/1, and the Cambridge Nokia Research Centre.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. NEST, Istituto Nanoscienze-CNR and Scuola Normale Superiore, I-56127 Pisa, Italy

    L. Vicarelli, M. S. Vitiello, M. Polini, V. Pellegrini & A. Tredicucci

  2. Laboratoire Charles Coulomb UMR 5221, Université Montpellier 2 and CNRS, F-34095, Montpellier, France

    D. Coquillat & W. Knap

  3. Department of Engineering, Cambridge University, Cambridge CB3 0FA, UK

    A. Lombardo & A. C. Ferrari

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  1. L. Vicarelli
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Contributions

M.S.V., A.C.F., W.K., V.P. and A.T. devised the experiments. L.V., M.S.V., D.C. and A.L. performed the experiments. M.S.V., D.C., A.C.F., M.P., V.P. and A.T. analysed and modelled the data. M.S.V., A.C.F., M.P., V.P. and A.T. wrote the paper.

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Correspondence to M. S. Vitiello.

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Vicarelli, L., Vitiello, M., Coquillat, D. et al. Graphene field-effect transistors as room-temperature terahertz detectors. Nature Mater 11, 865–871 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3417

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