Summary of HgCdTe 2D array technology in the UK

HgCdTe 2D arrays are needed in both medium (MW) and long (LW) wavebands for imaging, search, and track and guidance applications. Often the detector is the performance-limiting component in the system, and it is necessary to use detectors with very low excess noise and few defective pixels. Normally the detector is cooled sufficiently to freeze-out thermally generated leakage currents, so the main interest is to understand the mechanisms that determine the general detector performance and the cause of defective pixels. This paper describes the detector technology and the ion beam junction-forming process. The fundamental performance limits of homojunction HgCdTe technology and the doping levels needed to produce a detector with impact-ionization limited performance are discussed. Extensive studies have been made on defective pixels in long wavelength arrays and some technologies for reducing them are described here. Defective pixels have been found to be associated with material dislocations crossing the p-n junction and a model has been proposed for the noise-generating mechanism.