Laptop photothermal reflectance measurement instrument assembled with optical fiber components

In this article, we propose a laptop photothermal reflectance measurement instrument assembled with optical fiber components. The primary feature of this instrument is that all of the optical routes for the pumping and probing beams, as well as the beam sources using a laser diode, are composed of optical fiber and optical fiber components. With this configuration, the problems related to the technical shortcomings of the conventional instrument can be solved completely. Our proposed instrument is also appropriate for in situ measurement of the thermoproperties of thin film. The dimensions of our instrument's case are 400 mm wide, 250 mm deep, and 60 mm tall, and its weight is approximately 1 kg, containing the power supply for driving the laser diode of the pumping beam and electronics for the detection of photothermal reflectance. These are at least 1/20 and 1/50 smaller than the volume and weight of the conventional commercial instrument, respectively. Nevertheless, it is only necessary to prepare a synchronous detection instrument for signal recovery (e.g., lock-in amplifier) with our instrument. To evaluate our instrument's thermoproperty measurement capability, we measured the thermal diffusivity and thermal conductivity of Au thin film. The thermal diffusivity of 1.5-mu m-thick Au film measured by our instrument matched previously reported values within a margin of error of a few percent. (C) 2007 American Institute of Physics.