Lab
V. Antonov's Lab
Institution: Royal Holloway University of London
Department: Department of Physics
Featured research (1)
We detect terahertz radiation emitted by a black-body object at room temperature. The probe consists of semiconductor detectors coupled to the cold finger of a compact cryo-cooler. The detectors are narrow conductive channels in two-dimensional electron gas which is sensitive to variations of photon flux through the mechanism of excitation and rectification of plasma waves. The excitation has a resonance nature, with an unexpectedly narrow FWHM, below 10%. The key element of the concept is a compact cryo-platform, which enables to use of highly sensitive cryo-detectors, while keeping the system compact, ∼ 34 cm side, and mobile. We discriminate the temperature variation of the black-body object as small as 1.0 K at a distance of 1 m. There is room for further optimisation of the detectors and optical system to boost the temperature resolution down to 0.5 K and the operation distance to 5 m, which are needed for practical applications.