SBIR-STTR Award

RESIST - Readout-ic for Extended SWIR Imaging Staircase-apd Technology
Award last edited on: 5/19/2023

Sponsored Program
SBIR
Awarding Agency
DOD : DARPA
Total Award Amount
$1,698,690
Award Phase
2
Solicitation Topic Code
HR0011SB20224-05
Principal Investigator
Atul Joshi

Company Information

Saaz Micro Inc

800 Calle Plano
Camarillo, CA 93012
   (805) 297-8128
   ??info@saaztechnology.com
   www.saaztechnology.com
Location: Single
Congr. District: 26
County: Ventura

Phase I

Contract Number: N/A
Start Date: 9/15/2022    Completed: 3/31/2024
Phase I year
2022
Phase I Amount
$1
Direct to Phase II

Phase II

Contract Number: 140D0422C0049
Start Date: 9/15/2022    Completed: 3/31/2024
Phase II year
2022
Phase II Amount
$1,698,689
DoD has a clear established need for 2-micron cut-off APDs. However, the developments of such a device face the following problems: Due to the longer cut-off the band gap of these devices is narrow, leading to increased dark current. To overcome the dark current the APDs must be cooled making the systems expensive, bulky and power hungry. The APD gain mechanism has an increased statistical noise related to the gain mechanism. This noise is characterized by an excess noise factor. If this factor is high, the APDs cannot be operated at high gains as the excess noise limits the signal to noise ratio (SNR). HgCdTe (MCT) APDs have been demonstrated to have very low excess noise factor and a tunable bandgap to achieve extended SWIR cut-off. However, these APDs have very high dark current and are not as producible as III-V devices. This causes MCT FPAs to be expensive and the systems to be even more expensive due to cryogenic cooling requirements. To overcome the above limitation our team has developed a novel 2-micron cutoff APD. The staircase APD demonstrated by our team has the following advantages: It has low excess noise (