Recent developments in CdHgTe-silicon hybrid focal planes

Infrared detectors consisting of photovoltaic CdHgTe diode arrays coupled to silicon multiplexing circuitry have been demonstrated in formats up to 64 x 64. In the long and intermediate wavelength bands respectively, progress is reported on 64 x 64 co-ordinate addressed hybrids, and on 64 x 64 CCD hybrids. Recent developments in hybrid technology and array assessment have demonstrated the feasibility for much larger arrays. Imaging studies have shown that NETDs of less than 0.05K are currently being achieved at 12.0μm cutoff wavelength using co-ordinate addressed arrays, and sensitivities less than 0.03K are being achieved at 5.0μm using CCDs. In the case of linear multiplexed arrays, conventional parallel input CCDs are compared with a new multiplexer architecture based on NMOS technology.