Transforming photodiode into avalanche photodiode: An efficient method improving the sensitivity performance of foundry-fabricated Si/Ge receiver

Avalanche photodiodes (APDs) are essential semiconductor optoelectronic devices that could effectively improve the optical receiver sensitivity due to the internal gain. Based on Si/Ge photodiodes (PDs) from standard foundry process design kits, this work demonstrates a simple tuning method to transform PDs into APDs and further improve optical receiver sensitivity by carefully increasing the bias voltage before breakdown. The tuning principle is demonstrated theoretically and experimentally. A useful method distinguishing whether a foundry-fabricated PD can be tuned to the APD is proposed via confirming if the tunneling breakdown happens before avalanche. Subsequently, based on the foundry-fabricated Si/Ge PD, the receiver sensitivity is improved by 5 dB via increasing bias voltage from 2 to 12 V under the non-return-to-zero bit rate of 10 Gbps, at the incident power of −16 dBm and gain of 3 the bit error rate is suppressed by eight orders of magnitude.

Authors

Institutions

Publication Details

Journal
Journal of Applied Physics
Published
2025-08-08
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0275057
Primary Topic
Photonic and Optical Devices
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00

Funders

Controls
|||
ALL TIME
JAN
FEB
MAR
APR
MAY
JUN
JUL
AUG
SEP
OCT
article

Transforming photodiode into avalanche photodiode: An efficient method improving the sensitivity performance of foundry-fabricated Si/Ge receiver

X. Wang, Anran Guo, Yongpan Liu, Bing Xiong et al.
Journal of Applied Physics
Photonic and Optical Devices
article

Transforming photodiode into avalanche photodiode: An efficient method improving the sensitivity performance of foundry-fabricated Si/Ge receiver

X. Wang, Anran Guo, Yongpan Liu, Bing Xiong, Xiayang Hua, Zhibiao Hao, Xiaoyu Feng, Yinjie Liu, Yubo Yang, Changzheng Sun, Hongtao Li, Yanjun Han, Lai Wang, Lin Gan, Jizhe Zhao, Yi Luo, Rui Wu, Jiyuan Zheng, Beichen Liu, B. X. Yu, Jian Wang
article en

Abstract

Avalanche photodiodes (APDs) are essential semiconductor optoelectronic devices that could effectively improve the optical receiver sensitivity due to the internal gain. Based on Si/Ge photodiodes (PDs) from standard foundry process design kits, this work demonstrates a simple tuning method to transform PDs into APDs and further improve optical receiver sensitivity by carefully increasing the bias voltage before breakdown. The tuning principle is demonstrated theoretically and experimentally. A useful method distinguishing whether a foundry-fabricated PD can be tuned to the APD is proposed via confirming if the tunneling breakdown happens before avalanche. Subsequently, based on the foundry-fabricated Si/Ge PD, the receiver sensitivity is improved by 5 dB via increasing bias voltage from 2 to 12 V under the non-return-to-zero bit rate of 10 Gbps, at the incident power of −16 dBm and gain of 3 the bit error rate is suppressed by eight orders of magnitude.

Journal of Applied PhysicsVol. 138(6)
China Electronics Technology Group Corporation (CN), Tsinghua University (CN)
National Natural Science Foundation of China, National Science and Technology Major Project
Affordable and clean energy
Openalex Percentile: Top 81%
Photonic and Optical Devices
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
AI Navigator

Ask Laika to Summarize, Analyze, and Connect papers live on the map.

Summarize Papers & Methodologies

Extract key findings, datasets, and comparative methods across publications.

Benchmark Rankings & Visual Analytics

Rank top research institutions, authors, funders, topics, and journals by Field-Weighted Citation Impact (FWCI) and paper volume with instant charts.

Connect Distant Disciplines

Bridge topological clusters on the map to find hidden collaborative intersections.