铟镓砷焦平面阵列在微光夜视应用中的潜力及前景

The Potential and Prospect of Indium Gallium Arsenide Focal Plane Array Applied to Low Light Level Night Vision

得益于夜气辉在短波红外（SWIR）0.9～1.7μm波段的自然辐射数十倍强于夜天空在可见光和近红外（NIR）0.4～0.9μm波段的辐射，SWIR成像成为应用于微光条件下的成像探测的最佳选择，由晶格匹配In0.53Ga0.47As/InP制作InGaAs焦平面阵列（Focal Plane Array，FPA），灵敏于0.9～1.7μm波段，在整个响应波段具有超过70%的量子效率，和室温非制冷工作的极低的暗电流。通过减薄基底，还可将InGaAs FPA的短波限延伸至可见光波段的0.4μm。最近几年，超低暗电流、低读出噪声、大面阵和小像素尺寸的InGaAs FPA的开发取得了实质性的进展，特别是暗电流得到了数量级的降低，InGaAs FPA探测器已经显露出应用于微光夜视的极大潜力，并且还通过采用更复杂的温度相关的非均匀校正算法实现了无TEC的低功耗工作，基于超低噪声的密集阵列InGaAs FPA的SWIR成像技术有望成为新一代夜视技术的一个重要组成部份。

The shortwave infrared（SWIR）spectral irradiance in the 0.9μm to 1.7μm band which caused by night airglow is several ten times stronger than the irradiance in the visible and near infrared realm of 0.4μm to 0.9μm of the night sky, so SWIR imaging is the best choice for the imaging detection under low light level condition. The Indium Gallium Arsenide（InGaAs）focal plane array（FPA）sensors based on lattice matched In0.53Ga0.47As/InP is sensitive to SWIR light whose wavelength is from 0.9μm to 1.7μm, matching the spectral irradiance caused by night airglow, and have exceeded quantum efficiency of 70%over whole response spectral range, as well as with very low dark current while working at room temperature. Removing the InP substrate from the FPA allows extending cutoff wavelength to visible region of 0.4μm. The work on InGaAs FPA with ultra low dark current, low readout noise, large format and small pixel size has been progressing substantially in recent years, especially as the dark current of this sensor dropped in order of magnitude, the InGaAs FPA SWIR had demonstrated extreme potential for low light level night vision application, and low-power consumption with no-TEC work also has been realized by applying a more complex temperature dependent non-uniformity image correction algorithms. The ultra low noise and dense pitch arrays InGaAs FPA based SWIR detector will become an important part of next generation night vision technology.