The highly sensitive photoluminescence (PL) response of group III-Nitrides (III-N) nanowire heterostructures (NWHs) to hydrogen (H₂) and oxygen (O₂) allows for the realization of reliable gas detectors. For industrial real time gas monitoring applications, e.g. in the field of aerospace, a large scale laboratory setup was miniaturized by integrating electro-optical components and the NWHs within a robust micro optical system. As a result of the all optical addressing and read out the detection periphery can be completely isolated from the investigated environment which significantly increases the detection sensitivity. The optical design and fabrication techniques as well as an experimental investigation of the system performance are the main topics discussed in this paper.

Date Published: 5 March 2013
PDF: 9 pages
Proc. SPIE 8613, Advanced Fabrication Technologies for Micro/Nano Optics and Photonics VI, 861315 (5 March 2013); doi: 10.1117/12.2002411

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 8613:
Advanced Fabrication Technologies for Micro/Nano Optics and Photonics VI
Georg von Freymann; Winston V. Schoenfeld; Raymond C. Rumpf, Editor(s)