An uncooled infrared sensor of dielectric bolometer mode using a new detection technique of operation bias voltage

A new operation technique of dielectric bolometer (DB) mode infrared (IR) image sensor has been developed to ensure both highly sensitive IR detection and uniform IR sensitivity in every detector pixel. After calculating and adjusting the optimum amplitude and phase of supply voltage to the pixel circuit, the voltage waveform with individually adjusted amplitude and phase is supplied to every detector pixel for compensation of the output offset. A key technique is to use a field programmable gate array (FPGA) to feed the adjusted supply voltage to detector pixels when applying the compensation method to a pixel array. A program was also developed to make the adjusted supply voltage and induce the output of the detector pixels with data communication between the FPGA and a controlling personal computer. It was found that the compensation technique enables the I x 4 array to have nearly zero-offset level in all the pixels and therefore high and uniform IR detectivity. Finally, with this technique, we have fabricated several IR sensor arrays of 4 x 4, 8 x 8, and 16 x 16 pixels, where high IR sensitivities such as R-v and D* of 1.2 kV/W and 2.9 x 10(8) cm, Hz(1/2)/W, respectively, and a resultant two-dimensional image of an IR source were successfully obtained. (C) 2002 Published by Elsevier Science B.V.