MIDWAVE INFRARED AND ULTRA VIOLET TWO-COLOR DETECTORS

Modern missile technology, attack warning systems, or launch monitoring systems for ballistic missiles all have a great need for both ultra-violet (UV) and midwave infra-red (MWIR) detectors. Ofentimes, it is highly desirable to have two-color (UV/MWIR) detectors. An integrated UV/MWIR two-color detector can have many important features such as the ability to avoid false warnings which occur frequently if only an MWIR focal plane array (FPA) or other defense applications are used. However, there is no single mature material system that can cover such a broad range of wavelength from UV to MWIR.Researchers at Arizona State University have devised a monolithically integrated UV / MWIR detector. With this novel approach, one can demonstrate an MWIR detector FPA integrated with a single UV flux detector.