Review of Terahertz Photoconductive Antenna Technology: Nathan M. Burford Magda O. El-Shenawee

Review of terahertz photoconductive
antenna technology
Nathan M. Burford
Magda O. El-Shenawee
Nathan M. Burford, Magda O. El-Shenawee, “Review of terahertz photoconductive antenna technology,”

Opt. Eng. 56(1), 010901 (2017), doi: 10.1117/1.OE.56.1.010901.
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Optical Engineering 56(1), 010901 (January 2017)
REVIEW
Review of terahertz photoconductive antenna technology

Nathan M. Burforda,* and Magda O. El-Shenaweeb
a
University of Arkansas, Microelectronics-Photonics Program, 731 West Dickson Street, Fayetteville, Arkansas 72701, United States
b
University of Arkansas, Department of Electrical Engineering, 3217 Bell Engineering Center, Fayetteville, Arkansas 72701, United States
Abstract. Photoconductive antennas (PCAs) have been extensively utilized for the generation and detection of
both pulsed broadband and single frequency continuous wave terahertz (THz) band radiation. These devices
form the basis of many THz imaging and spectroscopy systems, which have demonstrated promising applica-
tions in various industries and research fields. The development of THz PCA technology through the last
30 years is reviewed. The key modalities of improving device performance are identified, and literature is
reviewed to summarize the progress made in these areas. The goal of this review is to provide a collection
of all relevant literature to bring researchers up to date on the current state and remaining challenges of
THz PCA technology. © 2017 Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE) [DOI: 10.1117/1.OE.56.1.010901]
Keywords: terahertz; photoconductive antenna; spectroscopy.
Paper 161629V received Oct. 19, 2016; accepted for publication Dec. 29, 2016; published online Jan. 24, 2017.
1 Introduction to Terahertz Photoconductive could allow penetration into materials to detect hidden
Antennas narcotics and explosives.9–11 Many works have studied the
Terahertz (THz) is the name given to the region of the potential use of THz imaging and time-domain reflectometry
electromagnetic spectrum lying between the microwave as a quality control tool in electronics fabrication and
band (<100 GHz) and the far infrared band (>10 THz).1 packaging12–20 as well as composite material inspection.21
This region is often referred to as “the last frontier” for Biomedical imaging using THz radiation has been proposed
electromagnetic waves, since historically there has been and studied for the purpose of cancer imaging,22–28 burn
comparatively little work observing the science and develop wound assessment,29–32 and dental tissue imaging.33 Many
the applications of THz waves. The reason for this is simple; other applications exist as well, and several in-depth reviews
efficient generation and detection of THz is an exceedingly are available for the various applications of THz imaging and
nontrivial problem. THz lies in the transitional region of the spectroscopy technology.9,10,24,34–41
electromagnetic spectrum between the classically described This review will focus mostly on the various key aspects
electronics region (radio, microwaves and millimeter waves) of THz photoconductive antenna (PCA) technology, while
and the photonic region (infrared, visible, UV, and x-ray), selected other technologies, such as photomixers, unbiased
where the quantum nature of light becomes dominant. surface emission, and optical rectification, will be discussed
Approaching the THz regime from either of these regions briefly. The fundamental theories of THz generation in PCAs
comes with unique challenges. Increasing the operating fre- will be discussed in detail. Key works from the literature
quency of microwave devices is limited by the carrier mobil- will be categorically reviewed and organized as follows:
ity of the oscillating semiconductor.2 On the other hand, photoconductive material development, large area emitters,
reducing the energy of emitted photons generated by electron plasmonic nanostructures, broadband performance improve-
transitions in a semiconductor is inhibited by the fact that the ment, and commercially available systems.
energy of THz photons is less than the thermal energy at
room temperature.3 Other methods, that combine aspects of 1.1 Theory of Terahertz Photoconductive Antennas
both photonics and electronics4,5 have been utilized, though
these come with their own list of challenges. Emission and detection of pulsed broadband THz radiation
However, the challenges facing the various methods of from optically pumped PCAs was first accomplished in the
THz generation and detection have not stopped the develop- late 1980s by the research groups of THz pioneers David
ment of this technology. Although THz technology is not Auston42–45 and Daniel Grischkowsky.1,46,47 The concept
nearly as mature as that of other regions of the electro- of generation of pulsed THz radiation from a PCA is illus-
magnetic spectrum, many practical applications have been trated in Fig. 1(a). Here, an example of a femtosecond optical
proposed and are currently under development. One of the pulse with a pulse duration of <1 ps is incident on a PCA.
earliest commercial applications of THz imaging and spec- The PCA consists of a DC biased metal dipole antenna pat-
troscopy is nondestructive screening of pharmaceuticals. terned on a photoconductive substrate. The optical pulse is
Changes in solid state crystal form6 and spectral fingerprint- incident on the antenna gap (G), propagates into the photo-
ing of chemical compounds have been demonstrated.7,8 conductor, and begins to generate photocarriers inside the
Spectral fingerprinting has been proposed for security appli- photoconductor as it is absorbed, as shown in Fig. 1. The
cations as well, since the nondestructive nature of THz waves generated photocarriers are accelerated in the DC bias
field, producing a transient photocurrent, which drives the
dipole antenna and ultimately re-emits as a THz frequency
*Address all correspondence to: Nathan M. Burford, E-mail: nburford@uark pulse.42–45,48,49 The transient response of the PCA is illus-
.edu trated in Figs. 1(b)–1(e). As the optical pulse is absorbed
Optical Engineering 010901-1 January 2017 • Vol. 56(1)

Burford and El-Shenawee: Review of terahertz photoconductive antenna technology
Fig. 1 Illustrative example of pulsed THz generation in a PCA. (a) Femtosecond optical pulse propagates
into the photoconductor, generates a transient photocurrent, which drives the antenna, and is re-emitted
as a broadband THz pulse. (b–e) Time profile of the carrier generation (red trace) and photocurrent in
the antenna gap for photoconductive material (gray trace) for short-carrier lifetime and (blue trace) for
long carrier lifetime.
in the photoconductor, carriers are generated at a rate propor- illustrates the main device components, which include the
tional to the optical pulse (red trace). The photocarriers photoconductive substrate, THz dipole antenna electrodes,
respond by accelerating along the DC bias field, thus gen- and high-resistivity float-zone silicon (HRFZ Si) lens. THz
erating a transient photocurrent with a rise time approxi- waves are generated at the antenna dipole, where the optical
mately proportional to the incident optical pulse rise time pump is focused. The THz radiation propagates along the
(gray trace). After the photocurrent peaks, as shown in axis of the optical pump, into the photoconductive substrate
Fig. 1(d), the decay time is then dictated by the electrical and then into air, with the majority propagating into the
properties of the photoconductor rather than the temporal substrate.65 The HRFZ Si lens couples with the generated
profile of the optical pulse.48 As shown in Fig. 1(e), if the THz radiation and propagates it into free space. Top views
photoconductor has a short carrier lifetime (gray trace), of the full area and enlarged dipole regions are shown in
the photocarriers generated by the optical pulse will begin Figs. 2(b) and 2(c), respectively. Here, it can be seen that
to recombine immediately after the optical pulse is fully parallel microstrip lines connect the centrally located dipole
absorbed.48–50 By contrast, if the photoconductor has a long antenna to larger bias pads. These bias pads act as a large
carrier lifetime (blue trace), the generated photocarriers will electrical surface connection for wire bonding to external
continue to contribute to the photocurrent after the optical circuitry that is used to apply the DC bias voltage. The
pulse is fully absorbed. This has the effect of broadening overall lateral dimension L of the device is typically in
the photocurrent pulse, which would in turn broaden the out- the range of a few millimeters to around a centimeter. The
put pulse and reduce the overall THz frequency bandwidth. antenna dipole length D is typically on the order of 100 μm,
To prevent this, photoconductors with subpicosecond carrier while the gap dimension G can range from a few microm-
lifetime are often utilized, with low temperature grown eters to almost D.
gallium arsenide (LT-GaAs) being the most common.51–64 Detection of the emitted THz pulses is often accom-
An approximately to-scale illustration of a typical THz plished either through the use of calibrated THz power
PCA is shown in Fig. 2. The isometric view in Fig. 2(a) detectors, such as bolometers34,55,66–69 and pyroelectric

Optical Pump
(a) Isometric View
Antenna
Electrodes
HRFZ Si Lens
Fig. 3 Schematic diagram of the typical configuration of electro-optic

sampling of THz pulses in a TDS system.
(b) Top View - Full (c) Top View - Dipole

This provides a narrow impulse of photocarriers at a time
that can be controlled by the optical delay line. When the
HRFZ Si Lens photocarrier impulse and THz field induces transient voltage
L overlap in time, a measurable photocurrent proportional to
the instantaneous antenna voltage is induced across the
antenna. By sweeping the optical delay line, the photocarrier
D G impulse signal is convoluted with the THz field induced
transient voltage signal. Collecting and correlating both the
optical delay position and induced photocurrent data allows
Photoconductor the temporal profile of the THz pulse to be measured. The
coherent nature of this detection method provides a high sig-
Optical Pump nal-to-noise ratio (SNR), since it greatly reduces the effects
of blackbody radiation and other sources of THz radiation on
Bias Pads
Microstrip Lines the receiver.78
Although the exact nature of THz generation in PCAs is
Fig. 2 (a) Isometric view of a typical THz PCA device mounted on a not universally agreed upon, currently, there are three main
HRFZ Si lens. (b) Full top view of the THz PCA and (c) expanded top
view of the centrally located THz dipole structure only showing gap
modalities in which THz generation in a PCA can be
dimension G and dipole length D. explained: the transient acceleration of carriers in the bulk
semiconductor,56,67,77,79 the instantaneous drop in dipole gap
resistivity after optical pulse absorption,50,80 and the direct
detectors,10,70–74 or more completely by electro-optic sam- collection of photocarriers by the antenna electrodes.72,76,81,82
pling of the THz pulse in a time-domain spectroscopy (TDS) When a femtosecond optical pulse is incident in the gap of
configuration.8,43,44,48,72,75 The later method allows extraction a THz PCA, electron–hole pairs are generated everywhere in
of the temporal profile of the THz field. The schematic of the gap, proportional to the local intensity of the incident
a THz time-domain system is shown in Fig. 3. THz is gen- optical pulse.48,50,77 The photocarriers are accelerated along
erated through the previously described conversion of a the DC bias field and recombined a short distance later. This
femtosecond optical pulse to broadband THz pulse at the induces time-varying surface currents on the device struc-
emitter.42–45,48,49 The emitter is biased with a DC voltage, ture, which in turn produces a propagating THz pulse with
and often the time-averaged photocurrent is measured as the electric field ETHz described by Ref. 77:
well. In general, the power of the emitted THz pulse is pro-

portional to the measured photocurrent across the dipole Z J r 0 ; t − jr−r 0 j
antenna.48,50,76,77 1 ∂ s c
ETHz ðr; tÞ ¼ − ds 0 ; (1)
To measure the emitted THz pulse, another PCA is uti- 4πϵ0 c2 ∂t jr − r 0 j
EQ-TARGET;temp:intralink-;e001;326;207
lized as the receiver. Unlike the emitter, the receiver PCA

does not have an external DC bias. Instead, the emitted where J s is the spatially and temporally dependent surface
THz beam is focused on the dipole antenna, so the beam current on the emitter surface, r is the spatial vector of
polarization is aligned across the antenna gap.1,48,78 As the the location of the THz field, r 0 is spatial vector of the loca-
THz pulse propagates into the antenna, it induces a transient tion of the surface current, which is integrated across the
bias voltage across the gap. To measure this transient volt- emitter surface ds 0 , c is the speed of light in vacuum, and
age, a portion of the femtosecond optical pulse is split from ϵo is the permittivity of free space. From Eq. (1), it can
the source beam, propagates through an adjustable optical be seen that the radiated THz field will be dependent on
delay line, and focuses in the gap of the receiver PCA. the net surface currents in a PCA emitter. By considering

applied bias voltage and incident optical pump power.

Generally, the signal strength is expressed as the time-aver-
age of the output THz power or the peak in the output THz
electric field. With the more recent advent of higher-power
THz emitters, the optical-to-THz conversion efficiency has
arisen as an additional performance metric.76 This is a useful
metric to compare the total input optical power to the total
output THz power.
Increasing the signal strength in a THz PCA-based system
would be useful for applications where signal penetration
into lossy materials is necessary, including biomedical imag-
ing,25,26,30 biological applications such as mapping water
content in leaves,88,89 security screening,9–11 and others.
Fig. 4 Cross-section illustration of optical carrier generation at the Similar to the SNR metric, the bandwidth depends on several
dipole gap of a LT-GaAs based THz PCA showing the flux lines of factors in a THz system other than the PCA emitter. Unlike
the electric field in red arrows. radio frequency antennas, where the frequency bandwidth is
determined by the −10 dB range, the THz bandwidth of a
PCA is often expressed as the range of frequencies, where
the various sources of surface currents, it is possible to
the measured frequency-domain signal strength exceeds
describe the different mechanisms of THz emission.48,50,77
the system noise level. Increased bandwidth is important
To understand the various mechanisms that produce THz
for applications that utilize distinct spectral characteristics
radiation in a PCA, consider the cross-section illustration of
in materials.7,8 For example, THz imaging and spectroscopy
a THz PCA dipole shown in Fig. 4. A typical device archi-
for pharmaceuticals requires the ability to observe narrow
tecture, which includes metal anode and cathode on a ∼1-μm
absorption peaks in the THz band. Therefore, increasing
thick LT-GaAs photoconducting layer above a ∼500-μm
the bandwidth of a THz PCA-based system could allow addi-
thick semi-insulating GaAs (SI-GaAs) substrate, is shown. tional vibrational modes to be quantified.7,8
The first cause of THz generation arises directly from the
generation and acceleration of charge in the photoconductor
2 Photoconductive Material Development
known as the current surge model.73 Electron–hole pairs gen-
erated in the gap will be separated; they accelerate along the 2.1 Challenges
bias electric field, as shown in Fig. 4, and recombine a short
time later.56,73,79,83 For the second cause of THz generation, Since the first demonstrations of early photoconductive
consider the state of the PCA device prior to optical excita- switches, the main factor enabling their effective perfor-
tion. Due to the parallel-line nature of the device, there is mance has been the selection of specific photoconductive
a capacitive energy stored across the gap in the form of materials with necessary electro-optic characteristics.43,51,52,90
positive and negative charge accumulation at the anode The common perception is that for a PCA emitter or
and cathode, respectively.80 The magnitude of this charge is detector to have broadband performance, the photoconduc-
dependent on the device geometry, bias voltage, and gap tive material must have a subpicosecond carrier lifetime.
resistivity.80,84 The gap resistivity, which also determines However, carrier lifetime is only one of several material
the bias electric field distribution in the photoconductor, is properties dictating a PCAs overall performance for a
particular application. In addition to a low carrier lifetime,
dependent on the carrier concentration inside the photocon-
maintenance of relatively high carrier mobility, appropriate
ductor. Exciting the gap with an optical pulse causes a sharp
bandgap, high breakdown voltage, suppression of zero bias
rise in the carrier concentration and, consequently, a drop in
photocurrent, and maximizing the material dark resistivity
resistivity. This causes a THz frequency oscillation in the
play a role in a complex relationship, which influences
antenna metallization as the bias field responds.48,77,80 The
a PCA’s output power, maximum optical pump power and
third cause of THz generation comes from optical injection
bias voltage, bandwidth, and SNR.57,80,86,91,92
of current directly into the antenna electrodes.77,80,85 Any
Thus far, the most studied and promising materials for
photocarriers generated in sufficient proximity to the antenna THz PCAs have included bulk gallium arsenide (GaAs),51–64
electrodes will be collected by the antenna before they bulk indium gallium arsenide (InGaAs),69,87,93–99 alternating
recombine. This acts as a driving current that, provided nanoscale multilayers of InGaAs and indium aluminum
the induced current pulse is sufficiently short, also induces arsenide (InAlAs),100–107 and select other group III-VI
THz oscillations in the antenna.77,80,85 semiconductors.91,108–111 The following sections will indi-
Often, the performance of THz PCA-based systems is vidually address each material system, reviewing key works
described by one or more of the following metrics: system and summarizing their unique contributions and applications
SNR, strength of the THz signal, bandwidth of the THz sig- to the development of THz PCA technology.
nal, and optical-to-THz conversion efficiency.36 The SNR of
a THz PCA system depends on several complex factors
besides the THz PCA emitter.86,87 SNR is often defined as 2.2 Gallium Arsenide
the ratio of the peak signal in the frequency-domain spectra Although the earliest demonstrations of PCA technology
with the amplitude of the system noise (i.e., the measured utilized argon ion (Ar3þ ) irradiated crystalline silicon epitax-
RMS signal amplitude at the detector when the THz beam is ially grown on sapphire (SOS),43,90 GaAs has long been the
blocked). The strength of the THz signal depends on the THz preferred material for PCAs. GaAs has a room temperature
PCA emitter material and configuration, as well as the bandgap of 1.424 eV (871 nm),112 making it compatible with

the titanium-doped sapphire (Ti3þ :sapphire) femtosecond-

pulsed laser sources commonly used to excite PCAs. GaAs
is normally utilized in one of three forms: SI-GaAs, LT-GaAs,
and ion-implanted GaAs, such as nitrogen (GaAs∶N3− ).
Early works by Warren et al.,51 Gupta et al.,52 and Harmon
et al.53 studied the effects of GaAs growth temperature on the
carrier lifetime and THz PCA performance. Warren et al.51
utilized LT-GaAs (250°C growth temperature), SI-GaAs and
SOS based PCAs in a THz TDS setup to compare the effec-
tiveness of each as both transmitters and receivers. Under 70-
fs optical pulse excitation, identical performance was found
in the SI-GaAs and LT-GaAs samples acting as emitters, with
both the LT-GaAs and SOS acting as receivers. This indi-
cated similar quality in the crystal structure of the GaAs
samples. Comparing the configuration using GaAs samples
as both emitter and receiver with the configuration using Fig. 5 Precipitate diameter and precipitate spacing versus 30-s
anneal for the two LT-GaAs films used in this study.53 Reprinted
only SOS samples demonstrated five times higher peak from Ref. 53, with permission of AIP Publishing.
in the detected THz signal and a 0.71-ps pulse width.51
Gupta et al.52 compared PCA performance in a TDS con-
figuration using LT-GaAs and chromium-doped GaAs fields as high as 200 kV∕cm, with a drastically higher dark
(GaAs∶Cr3þ ). For the LT-GaAs samples, the LT-GaAs resistance compared to the SI-GaAs emitter. Higher dark re-
was grown by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) at temper- sistance indicated a higher breakdown voltage and was dem-
atures between 200°C and 250°C. GaAs growth in this onstrated by showing breakdown in a 5 μm gap dipole at
temperature range leads to two benefits: high level of crys- biases of 160 V for the LT-GaAs, as compared with 50 to
tallinity, which in turn leads to higher carrier mobility, and 70 V for the SI-GaAs.55 Similar work by Stone et al.56 com-
excess As3þ within the crystal structure manifesting as point pared SI and LT-GaAs PCAs with various large electrode
defects. These point defects act as recombination centers, dipole geometries. Triangular, circular, and square dipoles
drastically reducing the carrier lifetime. Gupta et al.52 were characterized using a Golay cell detector to measure
showed that LT-GaAs samples grown at 190°C and 200°C their power emission spectrum, with the frequency-domain
yielded a carrier lifetime below 400 fs. By comparison, the peak frequency location and FWHM bandwidth being the
GaAs∶Cr3þ samples grown at temperatures above 250°C comparing factors.56 In all geometries, the LT-GaAs based
yielded carrier lifetimes greater than 50 ps.52 The work of emitters had higher peak frequency and higher bandwidth,
Harmon et al.53 further explained the nature of growth tem- with the largest bandwidth of 0.9 THz being observed in
perature and postgrowth annealing on GaAs carrier lifetime. the LT-GaAs based circular dipole.56 Additionally, it was
Here, GaAs thin films were epitaxially grown on top of observed that for conditions yielding similar output THz
sacrificially lift-off layer to allow removal and differential power, the LT-GaAs based emitters produced lower photo-
transmission measurements to be performed. Differential current than their SI-GaAs based counterparts.56 With
transmission measurements allowed the carrier lifetime to lower photocurrent, thermal effects arising from high optical
be derived. By combining this with transmission electron pump power and bias voltages were reduced.56 Later work by
microscope (TEM) imaging, it was found that the carrier life- Moon et al.57 demonstrated that postgrowth annealing of LT-
time is directly related to the spacing of the excess As3þ GaAs allowed the sheet resistance and carrier lifetime to be
clusters.53 Spacing and diameter of the arsenic clusters as manipulated. Annealing causes the excess As3þ precipitates
a function of anneal temperature was extracted from the to form clusters within the crystal structure, the size and
TEM data for films with two different growth temperatures, spacing of which are controlled by growth temperature
250°C and 320°C, as shown in Fig. 5 (Fig. 1 in Ref. 53).53 and postgrowth anneal temperature. Removing the As3þ pre-
Tani et al.54 studied LT-GaAs growth temperature and cipitates from their uniform distribution as antisites in the
anneal time effects along with their performance character- crystal structure had the positive effect of increasing the
istics when implemented in THz PCA emitters.55 LT-GaAs material resistance, as well as the negative effect of increas-
grown at 250°C and annealed postgrowth at 600°C for 5 min ing the carrier lifetime.57 TEM imaging of the postgrowth
was found to yield a 0.3-ps carrier lifetime.54 PCA dipoles annealed LT-GaAs as well as the relationship between
with different electrode shapes were fabricated and com- sheet conductance and cluster diameter with anneal temper-
pared with SI-GaAs with a ∼100-ps carrier lifetime.55 As ature is shown in Fig. 6 [Figs. 2(a) and 3(a) in Ref. 57].57
with the results of Gupta et al.,52 the emitted pulse shapes It was shown that for a given growth temperature, the post-
of both emitters were comparable, with the amplitude of grown anneal temperature can be tuned to yield an optimum
the SI-GaAs based emitter being over five times higher THz emission performance. It was found that in the range of
than the LT-GaAs emitter.55 However, this was observed 500°C to 620°C, the maximum peak-to-peak THz pulse
at relatively low optical pump power (15 mW) and low intensity was observed for postgrowth anneal temperatures
DC bias (30 V). Analysis of the dark I-V and output THz between 540°C and 580°C, for growth temperatures of
power versus input optical power characteristics showed 200°C and 230°C.57
the LT-GaAs based emitters to have higher saturation thresh- In addition to low-temperature growth, several groups
olds as compared to the SI-GaAs. At biases above 5 V, the have investigated the use of ion-implanted GaAs for
LT-GaAs emitter showed a linear I − V relationship for bias THz.58–64 Liu et al.58,59 characterized the effect of As3þ

Fig. 7 Schematic of two-step 1.57-μm photon absorption process

enabled by midgap states in arsenic-rich LT-GaAs.114 Reprinted
with permission from Ref. 114. Copyright 2015 American Chemical
Society.
Use of GaAs∶Hþ as both the emitter and receiver was dem-

onstrated in a TDS configuration to provide a SNR nearing
104 from 0.1 to 1 THz.62 Although the work by Salem et al.60
indicated poor relative performance in GaAs∶N3− , this
material was shown by Winnerl et al.63 to have 40 times bet-
ter SNR than SI-GaAs based detectors, and nearly the same
Fig. 6 (a) TEM photograph of annealed LT-GaAs layer and (b) sheet SNR of LT-GaAs. Additionally, GaAs∶N3− PCAs operating
conductance and cluster diameter as functions of annealing temper- in a photomixing configuration have been shown to have
ature. Reproduced from Ref. 57 with permission from the Electronics a higher, bias independent cutoff frequency as compared to
and Telecommunications Research Institute.
LT-GaAs, which exhibited decreasing cutoff frequency with
increasing bias voltage.64
ion implantation of SI-GaAs acting as both PCA emitters and
receivers. Similar to low-temperature growth of GaAs, ion
implantation of As3þ in SI-GaAs introduces excess As3þ 2.3 Indium Gallium Arsenide
impurities within the crystal structure. However, GaAs∶As3þ In more recent years, the group III-V ternary compound
was claimed to have a benefit of improved controllability of indium gallium arsenide (Inx Gax−1 As) has been investigated
the excess As3þ concentration and uniformity as compared as a potential candidate for THz PCA photoconductive
to LT-GaAs. Although performance of the two materials is material.69,87,93–99 The benefit of this material is its potential
comparable at low bias voltage, the GaAs∶As3þ PCA exhib- to achieve 0.8 eV room temperature bandgaps, which allows
ited a higher bias voltage breakdown threshold above for 1.55-μm optical excitation. This is an advantage when
60 kV∕cm as well as a higher optical pump saturation considering practical implementation of THz PCA-based
point.58 The broadband THz performance of GaAs∶As3þ systems as 1.55-μm wavelength pulsed laser systems can
was characterized as a detector in a TDS configuration, be fully fiber based without consideration of dispersion
where a 15-fs optical pump was used to excite a ZnTe crystal effects. Although generation and detection of THz pulses
emitter and generate broadband (47 THz) pulses, as well as in LT-GaAs PCAs has been demonstrated using 1.55-μm
gate the GaAs-based detectors.59 Comparing GaAs∶As3þ , optical pulses,113,114 a significant reduction in performance
SI-GaAs, and LT-GaAs, it was found that SNR and band- has been observed as compared to 800-nm excitation.
width was greatest for the LT-GaAs detector (>40 THz This is mainly due to the lower absorption efficiency of
bandwidth) due to the comparably short carrier lifetime, LT-GaAs at 1.55 μm, since absorption at this sub-bandgap
while the GaAs∶As3þ and SI-GaAs had lower bandwidths wavelength requires interband transitions to excite carriers
of 32 and 24 THz, respectively.59 The noise was attributed to the conduction band, as illustrated in Fig. 7 [Fig. 1(a)
to thermal noise in the photoconductor, arising from residual in Ref. 114].114 Therefore, materials with bandgaps at or
photocurrents. Therefore, Liu et al.59 proposed that the noise below 0.8 eV have been sought out for use with 1.55-μm
in the GaAs∶As3þ emitter could be reduced by increasing fiber laser systems.
the ion-implantation depth, as this would effectively increase As previously discussed, short-carrier lifetime photocon-
the effective carrier mobility while retaining a short carrier ductors are needed to have the subpicosecond response
lifetime. necessary for THz generation and detection. For InGaAs,
Salem et al. compared THz PCAs based on arsenic,60,61 iron doping (InGaAs∶Fe2þ ) has been shown to provide
hydrogen (GaAs∶Hþ ),60,62 oxygen (GaAs∶O2− ),60,61 and the effective recombination sites needed for a subpicosecond
nitrogen (GaAs∶N3− )60 ion implantation. Lowest THz pulse carrier lifetime.69,87,93,97 Suzuki and Tonouchi demonstrated
intensity was observed in the GaAs∶N3− PCA, while the reduction of the emitted THz pulse from 0.68 to 0.57 ps in
GaAs∶Hþ , GaAs∶As3þ , and GaAs∶O2− demonstrated InGaAs PCA emitters due to Fe2þ implantation under
comparable output THz intensities when operated in the identical operating conditions.93 Additionally, InGaAs∶Fe2þ
saturation regime of the optical pump power (90 mW).60 demonstrated higher optical pump saturation power as well

as higher breakdown voltage, indicating further improve-

ment in performance at higher operating conditions.93
Utilized as a detector, annealing at 580°C was shown to
improve the detection SNR from 50 to 133.87 Metalorganic
chemical vapor deposition grown InGaAs∶Fe2þ was inves-
tigated across 830-nm to 1.55-μm optical excitation as an
emitter by Wood et al.69 and later as a detector by Hatem
et al.97 As emitters, highest THz power of 9 μW was
observed around 1.2-μm excitation wavelength.69 As detec-
tors, peak SNR of 125 was observed at 5-mW optical exci-
tation with bandwidth limited by the excitation pulse width.97
MBE grown nanoparticle embedded InGaAs was studied
by Salas et al.98 and Murakumo et al.99 InGaAs based nano-
composites containing rare-earth arsenide nanospheres were
proposed as a possible material for THz PCAs.98 Of the four
materials studied, lanthanum arsenide (LaAs) had over an
order of magnitude higher dark resistivity and three times
lower mobility as compared to erbium arsenide (ErAs), Fig. 8 (a) Embedded photoconductor; (b) electron trapping; and
lutetium arsenide (LuAs) and gadolinium arsenide (GdAs) (c) multilayer structure. Reprinted from Ref. 115 with permission
from OSA Publishing.
under similar growth conditions.98 Use of InAs∶Er3þ quan-
tum dot embedded InGaAs has been shown to provide higher
optical saturation intensity, an attractive property for high
power THz emitters.99 This lead to a 27.5× increase in detected THz amplitude
as compared to a nonmesa PCA.102 Other demonstrations
of InGa(Al)As multilayer-based THz PCAs have attempted
2.4 Indium Gallium Arsenide/Indium Aluminum to further optimize growth conditions, which are critical for
Arsenide (InGa(Al)As) Heterostructures maximum THz performance.103,105–107 Using a mesastyle
InGa(Al)As multiquantum wells (MQWs) and superlattices emitter with 2 nm InAlAs barriers and 400°C InGaAs growth
have been proposed as potential materials for THz temperature with no doping, high THz output powers of
PCAs.100–107 Similar to bulk InGaAs, InGa(Al)As can 64 μW were achieved at 32-mW optical excitation.107
achieve strong optical absorption under 1.55-μm wavelength Additionally, erbium arsenide (ErAs) quantum dot incorpo-
excitation, due to its tunable bandwidth. However, unlike ration into the InAlAs trapping layers has been studied and
bulk InGaAs, the highly tunable electro-optic properties shown to provide up to 1 V∕cm amplitude THz pulses at
of InGa(As)As have been proposed as an avenue to achieve 100-mW excitation wavelength.104 The most recent work by
equivalent (or better) THz PCA performance at 1.55 nm that Dietz et al.117,118 has shown optimal growth conditions for
LT-GaAs achieves at 800 nm.115 Although earlier works pro- 1060-nm excitation along with a further study of optimized
posed InGa(Al)As-based materials for THz PCAs,100,116 the Be2þ doping for 1.55-μm excitation detectors. Over 6-THz
first InGa(Al)As-based THz PCA operating at 1.5 μm was detection bandwidth and 90-dB dynamic range was reported
demonstrated by Sartorius et al.115 Alternating layers of for detectors fabricated on InGa(Al)As multilayers with
12 nm InGaAs∶Be2þ and 8 nm InAlAs were grown on Be2þ doping concentrations of 4 × 1018 cm−3 .118
InP wafers to form the PCA substrate. An illustration of
this configuration, showing the separate embedded photo-
conductor, electron trapping layer, and combined multilayer 2.5 Other Group III-V Materials
structure, is shown in Fig. 8 (Fig. 4 in Ref. 115).115 The Although GaAs and InGa(Al)As are the most widely
InGaAs∶Be2þ acted as the photoconducting region and studied material systems for THz PCA development, several
was grown using standard low temperature methods for other group III-V materials have been investigated as
bulk InGaAs; however, incorporation of Be2þ during growth well.66,108–111,119,120 THz emission in antimony (Sb) based
allowed the material dark resistivity to be increased by bal- materials, such as InSb,108 GaAsSb,109 GaSb,119 and
ancing against the As3þ antisites.115 To further increase the GaInSb,120 has been studied by several groups, although
net dark resistivity and decrease carrier lifetime, the InAlAs only the work of Sigmund et al.109 fabricated and character-
layers were included. This material had a higher dark resis- ized THz PCAs on the material. 1-THz bandwidths were
tivity than the InGaAs∶Be2þ and acted as a deep level trap- observed in a THz TDS system utilizing GaAsSb material
ping site for electrons.115 Conventional THz PCA electrodes in the PCA emitter and detector, although more study of
were fabricated on these materials to form both emitters and the growth conditions is needed to fully evaluate the potential
detectors, which were then incorporated into an all fiber THz of this material for THz PCAs.109 GaBiAs was grown at two
TDS experimental setup. Sub-1 ps THz pulses with band- different temperatures and used for THz PCA fabrication by
width extending above 2 THz were reported along with a Bertulis et al.110 Four times higher THz field amplitudes were
SNR of nearly 3 orders of magnitude.115 Other works have observed in a 330°C grown sample as compared to a 280°C
elaborated on this concept to further study this material’s growth.110 GaAs embedded superlattices of rare-earth arsen-
potential for all fiber THz TDS systems.101–107 ides of ErAs and LuAs were used in CW photomixing in
Roehle et al.102 utilized InGa(Al)As multilayers and plasmonic PCAs.66 In all cases, the rare-earth arsenide-
employed a mesaetching process to effectively increase based photomixers outperformed LT-GaAs photomixers at
the generated photocurrent while decreasing dark current. operation frequencies below 1 THz, though output power

Table 1 Summary of photoconductive material development for THz PCAs.
Advantages Disadvantages Key reported performance milestones
GaAs Most efficient material for 800 nm Poor absorption at 1.55 μm 104 SNR62 60 kV∕cm breakdown threshold58
excitation Well understood growth
and optimization
InGaAs 1.55-μm excitation Decreased gap dark resistivity 10-μW output THz power69 125 SNR 97
InGa(Al)As 1.55-μm excitation comparable Complex material growth 103 SNR115 6-THz bandwidth118
heterostructures dark resistivity to LT-GaAs 1-V∕cm THz amplitude104
Other group III-V Potential 1.55 μm excitation New materials with limited understanding 1 THz bandwidth, 102 SNR (GaAsSb)109
was higher in LT-GaAs for higher frequencies.66 Collier 3.2 Large Aperture Dipoles
et al.111 fabricated THz PCAs on InP to study the effects Overcoming the saturation limits of PCAs has been demon-
of surface roughness on the THz emission. Although surface strated through the implementation of large device apertures.
roughness showed no effect on the amplitude and bandwidth This was first observed in the early 1990s by the research
of THz emission, around 1 order of magnitude suppression efforts of THz pioneer David Auston.79,83,121,123,124 These
of the photocurrent was observed.111 This indicated that PCAs consisted of parallel microstrip line dipole antennas
such emitters could have higher operation thresholds as with gaps ranging from 130 μm to 4 mm. Various materials,
compared to nontextured materials, allowing for enhanced including SOS,79,83,123 InP,79,83,121 and GaAs,79,83,121,124 have
THz performance.111
been considered for use in these devices. Although initial
work utilized large aperture PCAs to demonstrate THz
2.6 Summary and Outlooks beam steering,79,123 it was noted that these devices have
the added benefit of improved power scaling due to reduction
The advantages, disadvantages, and key performance mile-
of the saturation effect.121,123 Extensive theoretical and exper-
stones for each of the material systems discussed are
imental work was later performed to fully understand the
summarized in Table 1. Although LT-GaAs remains the stan-
saturation characteristics.83 The emitted THz pulses were
dard for THz PCAs, the potential for all fiber-based TDS
measured in a TDS configuration to obtain the relationship
systems remains an attractive motivator for investigating
between emitted pulse amplitude and incident optical
and developing other photoconductive materials systems.
fluence. InP- and GaAs-based emitters were found to have
Remaining challenges for lower bandgap THz PCA materi-
als include reaching comparable (or better) carrier lifetime, similar THz amplitudes, around twice that of SOS emitters.
mobility, breakdown threshold, quantum efficiency, and In all cases, the large aperture emitters were shown to gen-
reproducibility to that of standard LT-GaAs devices. erate emitted THz pulses with peak amplitude electric field
values within 90% of the DC bias field value.83
Later works have further studied the properties of
3 Large Area Emitters large aperture THz PCAs.56,67,77 Benicewicz, Roberts, and
Taylor fabricated 500-μm gap microstrip dipoles on
3.1 Challenges InP∶Fe2þ and SI-GaAs and studied their saturation proper-
One of the major limiting factors of THz PCA technology is ties in a THz TDS experimental configuration.77 A compari-
saturation at high optical pump powers.55,77,83,121,122 Under son of the radiated electric field for devices fabricated along
no optical illumination, the photoconductor has a fixed car- different crystallographic axes showed only slight variation.
rier concentration N D or N A, where N D is the donor carrier This variation was unable to be described by the theoretical
concentration and N A is the acceptor carrier concentration.112 model and was attributed to variation in the material proper-
Illuminating the photoconductor induces an optical carrier ties across the wafer, not the specific crystal orientation.77
concentration, N opt , which induces an increase in the total The radiated THz power as a function of optical fluence
carrier concentration of N tot ¼ N D;A þ N opt . Changes in and bias voltage was measured, with excellent agreement
the material carrier concentration translate to a proportional being observed with the proposed theoretical model.77
change in electronic properties, namely the imaginary part Budiarto et al.67 studied the effects of AC biasing of a
of the permittivity. For optical pump powers, where GaAs-based THz PCA with 3-cm electrode gaps. The emit-
N opt ≥ N D;A , the imaginary part of the permittivity will ted THz pulse intensity was measured as a function of optical
begin to increase, causing a nonlinear increase in the surface fluence for two different emitter AC bias frequencies, 0.1 and
reflectivity of the air–photoconductor interface.122 Therefore, 1 kHz, and four different bias voltage amplitudes. In all
during operation of high optical pump power beyond the instances, the 1-KHz bias frequency increased the intensity
N opt ≥ N D;A region, the output THz power will experience of the emitted THz in the saturation regime.67 At the highest
a nonlinear increase, eventually reaching a saturation observed bias field of 6 kV∕cm, no saturation was observed
point, where increasing optical pump power produces little for optical fluence up to 90 μJ∕cm2 .67 Large aperture emit-
to no increase in output THz power.122 This effect is exag- ters were studied as well by Stone et al.,56 although the laser
gerated as the optical pump is focused to a smaller spot utilized in this study was not powerful enough to provide the
size.83,121 high optical fluence necessary to observe saturation effects.

fingers did not provide enhanced THz emission. At higher

THz frequencies above 0.4 THz, the increased capacitance
led to a high frequency roll off in the device performance.
However, at sub-0.4 THz operation, a larger device active
area could provide advantages of more efficiency heat
dissipation and reduced sensitivity to beam drift.80
Many others have utilized interdigitated electrodes in vari-
ous THz PCA designs for pulsed operation.63,104,106,129,132,136,137
Dreyhaupt et al.129 proposed a novel modification to the
interdigitated electrode design to overcome an inherent
limitation of this configuration. In standard interdigitated
electrodes, the bias electric field direction is rotated 180 deg
Fig. 9 (a) Micrograph of terahertz array antenna device. (b) Cross- between adjacent gaps. The carriers generated accelerate in
sectional view of terahertz antenna array. Reprinted from Ref. 131, opposing directions, leading to a net destructive interference
with permission of AIP Publishing.
in the emitted electromagnetic field. By incorporating a
shadow mask, which blocks the incident optical excitation in
3.3 Interdigitated Electrodes every other gap, photogeneration only occurs in regions with
the same bias field directions. This leads to a net constructive
Similar to large aperture dipoles, attempts to overcome the
interference, providing high intensity THz pulse emission up
saturation limits of conventional THz PCAs have investi-
to 85 V∕cm.129 This was expanded upon in later works,
gated increasing the device active area by implementing
including demonstration of an interdigitated PCA for THz
interdigitated electrodes.63,71,80,84,106,125–135 This configura- detection using an unfocused optical gating pulse,132 study
tion consists of a single anode and cathode, each connected of the dependence of generation and detection performance
to a number of open ended parallel microstrips. The anode on GaAs carrier lifetimes63, and emission of 2.5 V∕cm THz
and cathode microstrips were interwoven, so the space pulses in InGaAs heterostructure emitters under 1.55-μm
between two adjacent anode microstrips was occupied by wavelength optical excitation.106 All works indicate that
a cathode microstrip, and vice versa, with a fixed gap dis- improved performance was achieved by implementation of
tance between the two electrodes. An illustration and device the interdigitated large active area.63,104,106,129,132,136,137
photograph of this configuration is shown by Awad et al. in Hattori et al.130 characterized a seven-element array of
Fig. 9 (Fig. 1 in Ref. 131).131 By this method, active areas of larger area interdigitated electrode emitters. This was com-
a few hundred μm2 have been produced, allowing the optical pared to emitter arrays of noninterdigitated large area emit-
power to be spread over a larger area to reduce the saturation ters comprised of parallel microstrips with 3-cm gaps. This
effect.128 Unlike large aperture PCAs, interdigitated PCAs configuration is illustrated in Fig. 10 (Fig. 1 in Ref. 130).
have the added benefit of enhancing the near anode effect.127 Here, it was found that the noninterdigitated array produced
By reducing the saturation effects, these electrode configu- nearly two times greater peak THz emission, although they
rations have shown promise for providing high optical to require 6-kV bias voltage to achieve the same gap bias field
THz conversion efficiency even at high optical pump powers. as the interdigitated emitter under 30-V bias voltage.130
Interdigitated electrodes for improved performance in Others have implemented shadow masks for interdigitated
THz PCA photomixers were proposed by several groups PCAs,71,134,135 with reports of 20 THz ultrabroadband
in the early 1990s.125–127 The first truly broadband photo- performance under collinear operation135 and high pulsed
mixer implementing interdigitated electrodes for THz gener- operation average powers of 3.8 mW.71 Awad et al.131 pre-
ation up to 3.8 THz was demonstrated in 1995 by Brown sented an alternative method for preventing the destructive
et al.128 Using a log spiral antenna with 1.8-μm gap inter- interference occurring in nonshadowed interdigitated
digitated electrodes, a maximum output power of 10 μW PCAs. Here, rather than blocking the incident optical pulse,
was observed at a 0.3-THz operational frequency, with meas- the photoconductive material in every other gap of the device
ureable radiation up to 3.8 THz reported.128 Brown84 later was etched away. In addition to preventing destructive inter-
developed a model for predicting the performance of an ference, this has the added benefit of allowing the active area
interdigitated THz photomixer. Here, it was proposed that of the device to be increased since the etched region gaps can
by implementing a reflecting layer under the LT-GaAs be reduced while still allowing the majority of the electric
and tuning the thickness of the LT-GaAs cavity, the absorp- field to fall in the nonetched gaps.131 A similar device con-
tion of the incident optical pump could be optimized. This figuration was studied by Acuna et al.,133 which demon-
increased the output THz power by a factor of 7 due to strated peak THz fields of 15 V∕cm and 40;000 Hz1∕2 SNR
improved quantum efficiency of the device.84 Later work under electro-optic sampling.
by Gregory et al.80 extensively studied THz PCA photo-
mixers with varied interdigitated electrodes. Photomixers
with 3, 5, and 11 finger interdigitated electrodes were fab- 3.4 Dipole Arrays
ricated and characterized under CW and pulsed operation. Periodic arrays of dipole electrodes have been proposed for
Spatial mapping of the emitted THz radiation as a function improving various aspects of THz PCA performance.124,138–141
of location of a focused optical excitation was performed for Early work by Froberg et al.124 fabricated a linear array of
an 11 finger device. The results showed no enhancement of parallel microstrip dipole emitters on SI-GaAs. Each of
THz emission when focused at the electrode tips, as well as the 64 electrodes was individually biased, while the entire
no near anode enhancement effects. For CW operation, the array was illuminated with a train of 200-fs optical pulses.
larger active region provided by a larger number of electrode It was shown that by controlling the bias of the individual

PCA emitter. The microlens array was utilized to divide and

control the location of the excitation, so only regions leading
to constructive interference were excited, rather than utilizing
a shadow mask or etching the photoconductor in these
regions.141
3.5 Summary and Outlooks

stones for large area emitter THz PCAs are summarized in
Table 2. These devices offer a potential for drastically
increasing the optical-to-THz conversion efficiency, which
is necessary for high output THz power or efficient excitation
of multiple devices with a single-laser source. However, as
the device active area increases, the driving current can no
longer be considered a point source, leading to potential
phase interference issues not present in single dipole emit-
ters. Additionally, most large area emitters have complex
fabrication and/or packaging considerations. As solutions to
these problems continue to be sought out, large area emitters
will likely develop into standard THz PCA technology.
4 Plasmonic Nanostructures
4.1 Challenges
Fig. 10 (a) Schematic of THz emitter composed of seven photocon- Several groups have studied the use of plasmonic nanostruc-
ductive antenna units having interdigitated electrode structure. The
units are labeled A–G for later reference. (b) Structure of electrodes tures in both THz PCA emitters as well as receivers. Similar
and shadow mask of each unit.130 Copyright 2006 The Japan Society to large-area emitters, nanostructures attempt to more effi-
of Applied Physics. ciently utilize the incident optical pump. As previously
discussed, THz generation in conventional PCAs occurs
mainly due to the photocarriers that are generated in the
electrodes, the direction and profile of the emitted THz high bias field region (i.e., at the surface) and near the
pulses could be tuned.124 Various works by Klatt et al.138,139 antenna anode.80,85 However, in conventional PCAs, only
studied electrode arrays utilizing the photo-Dember effect a small fraction of the incident photons is absorbed near
for THz generation. The photo-Dember effect arises from the surface, with even less being absorbed in a region near
the optically induced space-charge gradient in unbiased enough to the antenna anode for the generated carriers to be
semiconductors due to the difference in electron and hole collected on a subpicosecond time scale. This translates to a
diffusion coefficients.138 This effect was shown to be distance of around 100 nm or less from the antenna anode.76
enhanced near the edge of an unbiased metal electrode,138 As an example, consider an 800-nm wavelength, 5-μm diam-
with photo-Dember excitation of electrode arrays showing eter optical beam focused in the gap of a LT-GaAs THz PCA
comparable THz generation as interdigitated PCA centered over the anode edge. Anode illumination has been
emitters.139 Berry et al.140 fabricated a 3 × 3 array of log shown to generate the highest levels of THz power, as com-
spiral antennas with nanoscale plasmonic electrodes. pared to the middle of the gap of cathode illumination.85
Using an array of optical microlenses, the incident optical Here, <2% of the total photons is incident in a lateral distance
pump was divided into nine separate beams and focused 100 nm or less from the antenna anode, and only around 13%
onto the active area of each device. The net output THz of these are absorbed in the first 100-nm depth of the LT-
radiation was shown to reach record high-average power GaAs. Therefore, considering only THz generation from
levels of 320 mW at an average pump power of 1.9 mW.140 the carriers that are collected by the anode, <0.3% of the
Microlens arrays were also utilized by Singh and Prabhu141 incident photons are theoretically able to contribute to
to excite the individual active areas of an interdigitated THz THz generation. The remaining photons are lost either by
Table 2 Summary of large area emitter THz PCAs.
Larger aperture Reduced saturation effects Order of magnitude higher bias voltage required No saturation up to 90 μJ∕cm2
dipoles optical fluence67
Interdigitated Reduced saturation effects Increased fabrication complexity and unable to 15 to 85 V∕cm THz amplitude129,133
electrodes incorporate broadband antenna designs
Dipole arrays Reduced saturation effects Increased optical alignment complexity 1.9-mW output THz power140

surface. The optical field induces oscillations in the material,

which follow the intensity envelope of the pulse rather than
the electric field. These oscillations in the material then
re-emit as a propagating THz pulse.5 Although optical rec-
tification using unbiased semiconductors and electro-optic
crystals has existed nearly as long a PCA technology,44
the first demonstration of THz generation from a nanostruc-
tured metal surface did not take place until 2006.151 This
early work of Welsh and Hunt151 studied THz surface emis-
sion from nanostructured metal surfaces excited by 800-nm
wavelength optical pulses. Here, it was found that the nano-
structured metal surfaces had much higher optical-to-THz
conversion efficiency than flat metal surfaces. However,
the peak THz field from the nanostructured metal surface
was still around 1 order of magnitude lower than the peak
field emitted from a zinc telluride (ZnTe) electro-optic crys-
tal. Additionally, it was found that the THz-optical power
dependence did not follow a quadratic dependence expected
from optical rectification alone. Instead, the power depend-
ence followed an x3.4 behavior, indicating other processes
such as surface plasmon excitation.151 This work was the first
evidence that THz generation utilizing plasmonic nanostruc-
tures could be possible.
Fig. 11 Cross-section of plasmonic enhancement showing local Several later works continued to explore THz emission
intensity increase. (a) PE-LT-GaAs and (b) LT-GaAs. Reprinted from
Ref. 114. Copyright 2015 American Chemical Society.
from metallic nanostructured surfaces.152–156 Welsh and
Wynne expanded on their initial work by studying a periodic
nanoscale grating structure etched into fused silica and
reflection from the anode metallization or are absorbed coated in a thin metal layer. Characterization of the optical
too far (>100 nm) from the anode to be collected before absorption spectrum showed a narrow absorption peak char-
recombining.76 acteristic of plasmonic resonance. This peak could be tuned
Plasmonics have been proposed as a viable solution for from around 670 to 870 nm central wavelength across a
overcoming this inherent limitation in conventional THz 20- to 50-deg incident angle range.153 For gratings coated in
PCA design. “Plasmonics” refers to the study of the collec- a 40-nm gold (Au) layer, the maximum output THz field was
tive electron oscillations that occur in subwavelength sized around 50% lower than the field generated from a 0.5-mm
metallic nanostructures when excited by an external optical thick ZnTe crystal. When coated in 45 nm of silver (Ag),
wave.142 These oscillations have been shown to enhance the however, the THz field dropped to over 2 orders of
optical near field by orders of magnitude, with the oscillation magnitude lower.153 Theoretical studies by Gao et al.154
frequency, magnitude, and spatial location of the enhance- investigated ordered arrays of metal nanodisks, rings, and
ment being tunable by the size, shape, and surrounding pyramids on a glass surface. The intensity of THz radiation
medium of the nanostructures.143–145 Plasmonics have emitted from these surfaces was shown to be highly depen-
been proposed and demonstrated extensively in solar cell dent on the nanostructure geometry, although geometry did
technology.143–147 Plasmonic enhancement of THz PCAs not alter the bandwidth of the emitted THz.154
follows a similar approach, where the nanostructures are Extensive experimental work by Polyushkin et al.155
designed to enhance the optical excitation field in regions utilized nanosphere lithography techniques to fabricate tri-
inside the photoconductive material where the generated car- angular nanostructure arrays and study their THz emission
riers most efficiently convert to output THz radiation. This is characteristics. Similar to previous works, it was found that
illustrated in the computational modeling work of Jooshesh the intensity of the output THz pulses was highly dependent
et al., shown in Fig. 11 (Fig. 4 in Ref. 114). Here, the optical on the size and shape of the nanostructures. Although the
field at the THz PCA gap is shown for cases with (PE-LT- output THz intensity was around 10× lower than a standard
GaAs) and without (LT-GaAs) plasmonic nanostructures ZnTe crystal, it was noted that certain applications could
located at the LT-GaAs surface. It is shown that the take advantage of the extremely thin (submicron) nature of
plasmonic structures enhanced the local optical field at these nanoplasmonics emitters.155 Ramakrishnan et al.156
the LT-GaAs surface.114 compared randomly nanostructured metal films to continu-
ous ones, observing up to 24× enhancement of output THz
4.2 Early Examples of Unbiased Nanostructured intensity as compared to continuous films. However, it was
Terahertz Emitters noted that the highest THz intensities observed were still
The first examples of using metal nanostructures for THz nearly 2 orders of magnitude lower than conventional THz
generation were not incorporated into PCAs. Instead, PCA emitters.156 Further work by Ramanandan et al.157 dem-
THz was generated through a process called “optical onstrated that absorption in the region near the Schottky
rectification.”4,5,148–150 Similar to PCA generation, optical junction of the device is critical for THz generation, more
rectification uses a subpicosecond optical pulse to excite than the total amount of light absorbed. This configuration
an unbiased semiconductor, electro-optic crystal, or metal is illustrated in Fig. 12(a) [Fig. 1(a) in Ref. 157], where the

Fig. 13 (a) SEM image of the 20-μm dipole on SI-GaAs substrate.

Fig. 12 (a) Schematic diagrams of the nanostructured Au∕Cu2 O (b) The active area of the hexagonal plasmonic array. (c) The active
Schottky junction THz emitter. The pump laser pulses are incident area of the strip plasmonic array. The diagram shows apex angle θ,
on the sample, generating THz pulses. A nanograting is fabricated gap size d , and periodicity p. Reprinted from Ref. 161 with permission
at the interface to facilitate the excitation of surface plasmons. from OSA Publishing.
(b, c) False-color SEM image of the grating after the deposition
of Au and Cu2 O, respectively. Reprinted with permission from
Ref. 157. Copyright 2014 American Chemical Society. observed in the 75–nm nanograting arrays, which increased
the 0.1- to 1.1-THz average power by a factor of 2.27.158 The
THz surface emission is enhanced by the optical interaction work was continued by Park et al.,159,160 where the electron
with the nanograting surface plasmons. Scanning electron beam lithography was replaced with an annealing process to
microscope (SEM) images of the fabricated device before self-assemble Ag nanoislands; additionally, the previously
and after cuprous oxide (Cu2 O) deposition are shown in studied nanogratings158 were further optimized to improve
Figs. 12(b) and 12(c) [Figs. 1(b) and 1(c) in Ref. 157].157 THz emission. The self-assembled Ag nanoislands showed
Several uniform conclusions can be drawn from the works 0.1 to 1.1 THz average power enhancement by a factor of 2,
studying THz emission from nanostructured metal surfaces. lower than the nanograting studies.158 Measurements of
First, the generated THz oscillations are a direct result of the the optical spectrum extinction coefficient of the array were
plasmon oscillations in the nanostructures. Second, there is compared to measured output THz power of the array for
a strong dependence on the intensity of the output THz on varied nanograting width.160 It was found that when the
the magnitude of the nanostructure plasmon resonance. peak in the extinction coefficient centered at the 800-nm
Third, the intensity of the emitted THz is generally 1 order excitation wavelength, the output THz power enhancement
of magnitude lower than that of a ZnTe crystal, though the across the 0.1 to 1.1 THz range was maximized at 2.4×.160
drastically reduced thickness of the emitter could provide Others have incorporated gap-located nanostructures into
advantages in certain applications. Although the previously THz PCAs to improve aspects of the device performance.
described works presented THz generation through unbiased Jooshesh et al.161 fabricated PCAs with ordered arrays of
optical-plasmon interactions alone, they were inspiration for hexagonal and grating nanostructures in the antenna gap,
later works combining nanoplasmonics and PCA technology as well as a reference conventional nonplasmonic dipole
for producing high-power pulsed THz sources. emitter, all on SI-GaAs. SEM images of the fabricated devi-
ces are shown in Fig. 13 (Fig. 1 in Ref. 161). Comparing the
plasmonic structures to the conventional reference, it was
4.3 Gap-Located Nanostructures found that the hexagonal structures had the greatest enhance-
The first demonstration of enhanced THz PCA performance ment of the THz pulse peak at a factor of around 5.5 at an
through incorporation of plasmonic nanostructure arrays optical pump power of 2 mW.161 Further work exploited an
was given in 2011 by Park et al.158 Standard bowtie dipole additional advantage of gap-located plasmonic nanograting
antennas were patterned on SI-GaAs substrates, followed by structures.114 Here, it was demonstrated that these plasmonic
electron beam lithography patterning of periodic nanostruc- structures could enable efficient absorption of photons
ture arrays in the dipole gap. Four different configurations with energy significantly below the bandgap of LT-GaAs.
were compared: two nanosquare arrays and two nanograting Exciting different PCAs with 1.57-μm wavelength femtosec-
arrays with 75- and 150-nm widths. Reflectance measure- ond pulses, it was shown that LT-GaAs based PCAs with
ments illustrated minimum reflectance in the 75-nm nano- the nanograting structures produced THz pulses with peak
squares at an 800-nm excitation wavelength. Comparing amplitude over 11 times greater than a conventional LT-
the nanostructured PCAs to conventional ones, it was found GaAs PCA. Even more significant was that the peak THz
that the greatest improvement in output THz power was field of the plasmonic LT-GaAs PCA was around 1.8 times

greater than that of a commercially available conventional anode. By nanostructuring the antenna electrodes, the effec-
PCA based on InGaAs, which had a bandgap below the tive area of the near-anode region can be increased, so the
excitation wavelength.114 This enhanced performance was full area of the incident optical pump falls on the near-
attributed to the introduction of midgap states in the LT- anode region. Additionally, the plasmonic resonances of
GaAs due to the presence of the plasmonic nanostructures. the nanostructures can be tuned in such a way as to concen-
These midgap states allow for two photon absorptions to trate the incident optical pump in the near-field region of
efficiently excite photocarriers from the valence to conduc- the anode, thus increasing the optical absorption inside the
tion band.114 A unique architecture for a thin-film THz PCA photoconductor near the anode. One of the first theoretical
detector was recently proposed by Mitrofanov et al.162 This predictions of this effect was made by Zhong et al., where a
device consisted of a thin 280-nm LT-GaAs layer located narrow cone shaped anode fully embedded in a LT-GaAs
between an AlAs∕Al0.2 Ga0.8 As distributed Bragg reflector layer was studied. Finite-difference time-domain (FDTD)
(DBR) and a periodic array of Au plasmonic nanostructures. studies illustrated that plasmonic enhancement of the optical
The nanostructures and DBR worked in unison to effectively field near the anode could be as high as 164 times greater in a
trap the incident photons in the LT-GaAs layer, increasing nanoscale cone electrode as compared to a microscale cone
the optical absorption and generated photocarriers. The electrode.163
detectors showed a 50% increase in detected photocurrent Early fabrication and experimental demonstration of a
when the nanostructures are included. This was achieved THz PCA with nanostructured electrodes was performed in
while maintaining a high dark resistivity of the device, 2012 by Berry and Jarrahi.164 Anode-ground-cathode dipole
which is necessary to minimize detection noise.162 antennas were patterned on an In0.53 Ga0.47 As photoconduct-
ing layer, with a 1-μm gap from the electrodes to the center
ground and a 100/100 nm nanograting array incorporated
4.4 Nanostructured Electrodes into the electrodes.164 These arrays, which were computa-
In addition to THz PCAs with gap-located nanostructures, tionally studied in previous work,165 increase the optical
several works have investigated nanostructuring of the absorption, which takes place near the antenna electrodes.164
antenna electrodes directly.66,71,72,76,140,163–166 The key dis- Emitted THz pulsed from fabricated devices were shown to
tinction here is that, in this configuration, the nanostructured maintain a narrow 590-fs pulse width and generate average
regions are electrically continuous with either the anode or output THz power up to 5 μW under 7-V bias and 85-mW
cathode, rather than being electrically isolated. An example optical power.164 This concept was expanded on in several
of this from the work of Moon et al.167 is shown in Fig. 14 works.71,72,76,140,166 Utilizing a 3 × 3 array of log-periodic
[Fig. 1(a) in Ref. 167]. Here, a microscopic image of a stan- dipoles with nanograting electrodes, high average output
dard dipole antenna structure is shown, along with SEM THz power of 1.9 mW was demonstrated under a 320-mW
images of the various nanoplasmonic grating structures optical pump power. These antennas, fabricated on LT-GaAs,
fabricated as part of the dipole electrodes.167 Most work required a microlens array for individual focusing of the
investigating nanostructured electrodes attempt to enhance incident optical pump onto the active area of each device.71
the near-anode effect, the high output THz power that is The highest observed optical-to-THz conversion efficiency
observed when the optical pump is centered over the was demonstrated by designing a three-dimensional array
of nanostructured electrodes.72 In this example, the nano-
structured electrodes consisted of rows of nanopillars
etched into a LT-GaAs substrate with Au contact electrodes
patterned on the sides and bottoms. These structures were
shown to further localize the incident optical pump near
the antenna anode and demonstrated a 7.5% optical-to-
THz conversion efficiency at a 60-V bias and 1.4-mW optical
pump power.72 Utilizing the plasmonic nanograting design of
Berry et al.,76,140 a large area emitter was fabricated and
demonstrated to produce a record high 3.8-mW average
THz power across the 0.1 to 5 THz range.71 This design
has the advantage of not requiring alignment of a microlens
array as in Ref. 140 as well as requiring comparatively
less complicated fabrication methods for the plasmonic
electrodes, as compared to Ref. 72.
Plasmonic nanostructured electrodes have been studied
by several other groups as well.82,167–169 Heshmat et al.168
fabricated THz PCAs on LT-GaAs with interdigitated
electrodes that had 100 nm anode-cathode gaps. The emitted
THz pulse peak-to-peak amplitude was found to be 2×
greater than that of a commercially available conventional
emitter. The improvement was even greater when compared
to similarly shaped conventional emitters fabricated on LT-
Fig. 14 (a) Optical microscope image of H-dipole structure and
(b–d) SEM of the fabricated nanostructures. Reprinted with permis-
GaAs and SI-GaAs, which gave 10× and 40× improvement,
sion from Ref. 167 under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 respectively.168 Tanoto et al.82 fabricated and compared
International License. THz PCAs with tip-to-tip and interdigitated nanograting

and fast Fourier transform spectra in Fig. 15 (Fig. 5 in

Ref. 167). The enhancement was attributed to two mecha-
nisms: plasmonic enhancement of the optical field near
the electrodes and enhancement of the DC bias field near
the electrodes. The dominating mechanism depended on
the power of the incident optical pump, which indicated
that nanogratings with the 3-μm gap were dominated by
plasmonic enhancement while the partially interdigitated
nanograting electrode was dominated by bias field
enhancement.167 Computational work by Burford and
El-Shenawee using COMSOL® Multiphysics proposed a
thin-film PCA emitter utilizing metal nanodisk arrays to
enhance the optical absorption in the photoconductor.170
It was shown that the combination of the plasmonic
structures and thin-film photoconducting layer effectively
localized the optical absorption near the antenna anode,
increasing the peak-induced photocurrent by nearly 3 orders
of magnitude.170

stones for plasmonic nanostructure THz PCAs are summa-
rized in Table 3. Similar to the large area emitters, these
devices offer potential for high-device quantum efficiency,
with some devices combining nanostructured electrodes
with large area emitter designs to yield record-high output
THz power of 3.8 mW from a PCA device.71 However,
due to the lack of maturity in nanoscale lithography technol-
ogy, fabrication of such ordered metallic nanostructures
remains far more complex than standard THz PCA devices.
This is exaggerated by the high sensitivity of the optical–
Fig. 15 THz emission from the large-aperture PCAs: (a) time-domain plasmon interaction with the nanostructure geometry, which
curves and (b) FFT spectra. Reprinted with permission from Ref. 167 increases the need for high fabrication standards. As nano-
under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. fabrication processes become increasingly standardized,
incorporation of plasmonic nanostructures may also become
electrodes in a CW photomixing configuration. A bolometer industry standard for THz PCA technology.
was utilized to measure the output THz intensity as a func-
tion of optical beat frequency. It was found that the tip-to-tip 5 Broadband Performance
configuration had around 2 orders of magnitude increase in
the THz intensity as well as increased bandwidth. FDTD 5.1 Challenges
simulations supported these measurements, showing that One of the attractive properties of pulsed THz emission from
the calculated optical field enhancement matched the out PCAs is the broadband nature of the emitted radiation.
THz intensity enhancement.82 Typically, usable bandwidths in the range of 0.1 to 4 THz
Moon et al.167 experimentally compared three different are readily achievable in LT-GaAs based PCA emitters
nanograting designs: nanograting electrodes with 3 μm and pumped with 100-fs pulses.48 There is significant motivation
200 nm anode–cathode gaps and nanograting electrodes for increasing the spectral power density of higher frequency
with partially interdigitated nanogratings between the anode components. However, several challenges exist in standard
and cathode. All devices showed increased power output at THz TDS configurations that limit the usable frequency
low optical excitation power as compared to a reference, bandwidth. Broadband performance requires dipole antennas
nonplasmonic PCA, as shown in the time-domain waveform with uniform radiation resistance and low reactance across
Table 3 Summary of plasmonic nanostructure enhanced THz PCAs.
Gap located nanostructures Increased quantum efficiency Decreased gap dark resistivity 2.1-nA peak THz current114
and complex fabrication
Nanostructured electrodes Increased quantum efficiency and Complex fabrication 3.8-mW output THz power,
no increase in gap dark resistivity 5-THz bandwidth71

by Gitin et al.174 and Mendis et al.68 In sub-0.1 THz frequen-

cies, the response was found to be highly multiband, with
resonant frequencies corresponding to the various lengths
of the periodic elements.174 Brown et al.175 fabricated
GaAs-based THz PCAs with square spiral antennas and
tested their polarization characteristics in a photomixing con-
figuration. This antenna was predicted to have a continuous,
broadband response at lower THz frequencies (<1 THz).
However, experimental results showed narrow resonance
peaks occurring across the 0.1 to 1 THz measurement
range. These results were attributed to the discrete nature
of the antenna pattern, where each turn of the square spiral
acted as an individual radiating element with a single, narrow
resonance.175 The same antenna was implemented in a
pulsed optical excitation scheme to study the effects of pho-
toconductive material and substrate.176,177 A bullseye dipole
Fig. 16 FFT amplitude as a function of frequency, showing a band-
width approaching 20 THz. Reprinted from Ref. 135 with permission
with periodic grooves in the dipole metallization was studied
from OSA Publishing. by Liu et al.178 This structure utilized THz frequency plas-
mon-polariton resonances along the periodic grooves to
produce a narrow, two times greater resonance peak at a
the desired bandwidth.140 For the wide bandwidths desired in single frequency as compared to a simple dipole. Numerical
THz TDS, this often leads to a tradeoff with other perfor- simulations indicated that this resonance peak can be tuned
mance characteristics.80 There are also inherent limitations by adjusting the size and period of the periodic grooves.178
in the available bandwidth of the optical femtosecond pulse. More recently, logarithmic spiral antennas were combined
Although narrower pulse widths with a wider available band- with nanostructured electrodes to improve the radiation effi-
width are available, high THz frequency losses in the PCA ciency of THz PCAs.72,140 Numerical simulations indicated
substrate often prevent the extension bandwidths to higher that the log spiral maintains a much more uniform radiation
frequencies using sub-100 fs excitation.75 Propagation resistance and lower reactance than the more common
through the PCA substrate has a detrimental effect on the bowtie dipoles, with experimental results showing around
THz bandwidth, especially in GaAs. GaAs has a phonon 4× higher radiated powers.140
absorption resonance centered at around 8.3 THz, as illus-
trated in the THz spectra shown in Fig. 16 [Fig. 2(b) in
Ref. 135].135 The absorption loss for a THz pulse propagat- 5.3 Ultrabroadband Emission and Detection
ing through 500 μm (typical substrate thickness) of GaAs Standard configurations of THz TDS setups have a major
increases rapidly with frequency, falling to 50% of the origi- inherent limitation of their usable bandwidth. In all TDS set-
nal signal strength at around 3.3 THz.171 This absorption ups, the optical pulse excitation is incident on the electrode
loss is a major limiting factor in the bandwidth of the emitted side of the PCA, since it would be unable to penetrate the
THz pulses and is the reason that utilizing below 100-fs optically thick substrate material to excite photocarriers in
optical pulses in these configurations does not significantly the dipole gap.43,48,78 The generated THz radiation is emitted
improve the bandwidth. in both directions; however, the majority of TDS setups only
utilize the forward propagating THz radiation (i.e., the radi-
ation that passes through the PCA substrate, propagating in
5.2 Broadband Dipole Antenna the same direction as the optical pulse). The reason for this is
Early THz PCAs, as well as many still in use today, utilized that it reduces the experimental setup complexity, since the
simple dipole antenna structures such as parallel microstrip optical and THz beam paths do not overlap.180 Additionally,
lines46 or face-to-face dipoles45,78 as the primary radiating the majority of the radiated power propagate into the sub-
elements. The major disadvantage of using such simple radi- strate, with the forward (in the substrate) to backward (in
ating elements is that they are inherently single and narrow air) power ratio being dependent on the substrate permittivity
band. Although the coherent detection nature of THz TDS (ϵr ) on the order of ϵ1∕2
r to ϵ3∕2
r , depending on the antenna
systems offers high signal-to-noise,172 losses outside of 65
geometry. As previously mentioned, this is at the cost of
the dipole’s resonant frequency range can be a significant loss of bandwidth due to high frequency absorption in the
source of performance degradation.80 Utilizing established GaAs substrate.
microwave engineering concepts, several works have One of the first works observing this effect was reported
aimed at implementing multi- and/or broadband dipole by Kono et al.181 Here, a SI InP electro-optic crystal pumped
structures to improve the radiation efficiencies of these with 15-fs optical pulses was utilized as a source of broad-
THz antennas.68,72,140,173–179 band (>20 THz) radiation. The same 15-fs optical pump was
To the authors’ best knowledge, the first attempt to study utilized to gate a LT-GaAs PCA detector in a conventional
the use of broadband antennas in THz PCAs was made in setup, where the optical pump and THz beam are incident on
1991 by Dykaar et al.173 This early work compared broad- opposite sides of the detector. A discontinuous frequency
band log spiral and log periodic antenna patterns to simple band up to around 20 THz was observed with a strong
face-to-face dipoles, with results indicating that the broad- absorption band between 7 and 9 THz due to the GaAs detec-
band antennas could yield an order of magnitude response tor substrate absorption.181 Later works using a similar setup
improvement.173 Log periodic antennas were also studied implemented a collinear detection scheme, where the optical

the spectrum, while increasing the pulse width reduced the

high frequency components of the signal.135

stones for plasmonic nanostructure THz PCAs are summa-
rized in Table 4. The design of broadband antennas shows
potential for increasing the useable THz bandwidth.
However, it is clear that other factors such as varying polari-
zation and resonant/no resonant regions across the desired
operating band would likely need to be accounted for when
implementing these complex antenna geometries into prac-
tical THz PCA systems. Shorter optical pulses and collection
of surface emitted THz waves have demonstrated ultrabroad-
band pulse emission, reaching well into the far-infrared
optical regime. However, since the optical beam cannot be
isolated from the THz beam, safety becomes a concern for
practical applications. Therefore, these configurations are
currently limited to laboratory research.
6 Commercial Technologies
In addition to the various THz PCA emitters and systems
Fig. 17 (a) The temporal THz wave form and (b) its corresponding described in the literature, several companies offer commer-
Fourier transform amplitude spectrum (upper trace, solid line), cially available PCA-based THz systems, as well as individual
together with spectrum measured in the presence of PTFE sample PCA devices. Teraview Ltd., Picometrix LLC, Advantest,
(lower trace, dotted line). Reprinted from Ref. 182, with permission
of AIP Publishing. and Menlo Systems offer complete THz imaging and
spectroscopy systems that utilize PCAs as their emitters and
detectors. Teraview’s TPS Spectra 3000 system utilizes
gating pump of the detector was aligned with the transmitted LT-GaAs based PCAs, with 800-nm wavelength optical
THz radiation and both were incident on the antenna side of excitation.184 Average optical power incident on the emitter
the detector.59,75,91,180 PCAs gated with 15-fs pulses were is ∼10 mW, producing around 1-μW average output THz
demonstrated to achieve the same bandwidth as electro-opti- power with up to 4-THz bandwidth (maximum frequency).184
cal sampling with a ZnTe crystal.75 Modulation of the optical The newer TeraPulse 4000 system has a maximum 70-dB
delay using the shaker method was utilized to measure signal and ∼80-dB SNR with bandwidth up to 6 THz.185
time-derivatives of the THz waveforms, which expanded the Picometrix’s T-Ray 5000 system utilizes LT-InGaAs PCAs
detectable emission from a ZnTe crystal up to 60 THz.180 for excitation at 1064-nm optical wavelength. The optical
Others have demonstrated the use of these broadband detec- pump power is ∼5 mW, producing ∼0.5-μW output THz
tion schemes to characterize vibrational modes in various pulse with an overall system SNR of >80 dB and >4 THz
materials, including cytindine182 and maltose183. A 40-fs bandwidth.186 Advantex’s TAS series systems utilize PCAs
THz pulse measured by Shen et al.182 is shown in Fig. 17(a) under 1550-nm wavelength optical excitation to achieve up
along with the Fourier transform spectrum illustrating a to 4 THz bandwidth and over 60-dB SNR.187 Menlo Systems
bandwidth beyond 30 THz in Fig. 17(b) (Fig. 2 in Ref. 182). offers two THz spectroscopy systems: the TERA K8 and the
Additionally, spectral measurements of polytetrafluoroethy- TERA K15. The TERA K8 is based on ∼800-nm optical
lene (PTFE) are shown as the dotted trace in Fig. 17(b). excitation and offers over 3.5-THz bandwidth and over
Here, PTFE vibrational modes up to 19.2 THz were 70-dB SNR.188 The TERA K15, on the other hand, claims
observed.182 More recent work has characterized the high to be the first commercial all fiber-coupled system utilizing
power, broadband forward emission of a LT-GaAs PCA 1560-nm optical excitation. This system has over 4-THz
with interdigitated electrodes.135 Here, a bandwidth of up bandwidth, 75-dB SNR, and total dimensions comparable
to 20 THz was observed. Reducing the incident pulse to a typical desktop computer.189 The performance of the
power caused a uniform reduction of THz power across various systems is summarized in Table 5.
Table 4 Summary of broadband performance of THz PCAs.
Broadband dipole Increased emission bandwidth Trade-off with polarization control 4× increased total THz power
antenna design comparing log spiral to bowtie140
Ultrabroadband Full THz band coverage Experimental setup not practical 60 THz detection bandwidth180
emission and detection for many applications

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177. J. Y. Suen et al., “Characterization and modeling of a terahertz photo- Nathan M. Burford received his BSc degree in physics from
conductive switch,” Appl. Phys. Lett. 96, 141103 (2010). Southeast Missouri State University in 2011 and his MSc and PhD
178. S. Liu, X. Shou, and A. Nahata, “Coherent detection of multiband degrees in microelectronics-photonics from the University of
terahertz radiation using a surface plasmon-polariton based photo- Arkansas in 2013 and 2017, respectively. He is an NSF GK-12,
conductive antenna,” IEEE Trans. Terahertz Sci. Technol. 1, 412–415 NSF I-Corps, and University of Arkansas Doctoral Academy
(2011). Fellow. His research interests include computational design for plas-
179. H. Ito et al., “Broadband photonic terahertz-wave emitter integrating monic optoelectronic devices, nanofabrication processes, electro-
unitraveling-carrier photodiode and self-complementary planar magnetic metamaterials, and THz imaging and spectroscopy, and
antenna,” Opt. Eng. 53, 031209 (2014).
180. S. Kono, M. Tani, and K. Sakai, “Coherent detection of mid-infrared he currently works for WattGlass in Fayetteville, Arkansas.
radiation up to 60 THz with an LT-GaAs photoconductive antenna,”
Optoelectron. IEE 149, 105–109 (2002). Magda O. El-Shenawee received her PhD in electrical engineering
181. S. Kono et al., “Detection of up to 20 THz with a low-temperature- from the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, in 1991. Her research inter-
grown GaAs photoconductive antenna gated with 15 fs light pulses,” ests include terahertz imaging and spectroscopy, photoconductive
Appl. Phys. Lett. 77, 105–109 (2000). antennas, microwave and millimeter wave characterization of materi-
182. Y. C. Shen et al., “Ultrabroadband terahertz radiation from low- als, computational electromagnetics, inverse scattering algorithms,
temperature-grown GaAs photoconductive emitters,” Appl. Phys. Lett. MEMS antennas, nanoplasmonic antennas, and biopotentials model-
83, 3117–3119 (2003).
183. Y. C. Shen et al., “Generation and detection of ultrabroadband terahertz ing of breast tumors. She published over 200 journal and conference
radiation using photoconductive emitters and receivers,” Appl. Phys. papers coauthored with her graduate students and postdoctoral fel-
Lett. 85, 164–166 (2004). low, and two book chapters coauthored with colleagues from other
184. TPS Spectra 3000, Teraview LTD, Cambridge, United Kingdom. universities.
185. TeraPulse 4000, Teraview LTD, Cambridge, United Kingdom.


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