France Telecom

France Telecom-establissement Autonome De Droit Public (centre National D'e

Andre Scavennec

Louis Menigaux

Alain Carenco

Thomas Barrou

Abdelkader Temmar

A metal-semiconductor-metal photodetector including an absorbent layer, a barrier layer of greater forbidden band energy on which there are deposited Schottky electrodes and a transition layer of graded composition, the photodetector including a doping plane situated in the vicinity of the join between the absorbent layer and the transition layer of graded composition.

Metal-semiconductor-metal photodetector

An avalanche photodiode having an absorption zone, a multiplication zone, and a transition zone disposed between the absorption zone and the multiplication zone, the transition zone being doped and being constituted at least in part by a material of composition that is graded such that the energy bands of the structure are substantially continuous when it is biased, wherein said doping is distributed non-uniformly in said graded composition zone so as to compensate, at least in part, the reverse electric field due to the composition grading of the material in the transition zone.

Avalanche photodiode

Method for making an integrated guide/detector structure made of a semiconductive material. This method consists of epitaxially growing on a semiconductor (2, 1) a lower confinement semiconductive film (4), a semiconductive guide film (6) and an upper semiconductive confinement film (8) with the same type of conductivity, the guide film being inserted between the confinement films having a prohibited band of energy smaller than that of the confinement films, of etching the upper film so as to form a guide strip with one extremity defining a first step (12) ending by a lateral broadening (28a) inside a plane parallel to the epitaxial films, of etching the released guide film so as to form a second step (16) adjacent to the first step, of epitaxially growing a semiconductive detector film (18) with this type of conductivity whose prohibited band of energy is smaller than that of the confinement films and the guide film, of eliminating that portion of the detective film covering the guide strip, and of forming the detector in the detecting film opposite the steps so as to embody a butt coupling between the guide film and the detector.

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Paris, France

Andre Scavennec