Towards a terahertz direct receiver based on graphene up to 10 THz

Mircea Dragoman, Martino Aldrigo, Adrian Dinescu, Daniela Dragoman, and Alessandra Costanzo

Citation: Journal of Applied Physics 115, 044307 (2014); doi: 10.1063/1.4863305

View online: http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4863305
View Table of Contents: http://scitation.aip.org/content/aip/journal/jap/115/4?ver=pdfcov
Published by the AIP Publishing

Articles you may be interested in

Analysis and design of terahertz antennas based on plasmonic resonant graphene sheets
J. Appl. Phys. 112, 114915 (2012); 10.1063/1.4768840

Full characterization and analysis of a terahertz heterodyne receiver based on a NbN hot electron bolometer
J. Appl. Phys. 100, 074507 (2006); 10.1063/1.2354421

Terahertz wave detection performance of photoconductive antennas: Role of antenna structure and gate pulse
intensity
J. Appl. Phys. 97, 103103 (2005); 10.1063/1.1905792

Generation and detection of ultrabroadband terahertz radiation using photoconductive emitters and receivers
Appl. Phys. Lett. 85, 164 (2004); 10.1063/1.1768313

THz radiation emission properties of multienergy arsenic-ion-implanted GaAs and semi-insulating GaAs based
photoconductive antennas
J. Appl. Phys. 93, 2996 (2003); 10.1063/1.1541105

[This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AIP content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation.aip.org/termsconditions. Downloaded to ] IP:
193.231.133.66 On: Wed, 11 Jun 2014 09:12:24
 JOURNAL OF APPLIED PHYSICS 115, 044307 (2014)

Towards a terahertz direct receiver based on graphene up to 10 THz

Mircea Dragoman,1,a) Martino Aldrigo,2 Adrian Dinescu,1 Daniela Dragoman,3
and Alessandra Costanzo2
1
National Institute for Research and Development in Microtechnology (IMT), P.O. Box 38-160,
023573 Bucharest, Romania
2
Department of Electrical, Electronic, and Information Engineering “Guglielmo Marconi”–DEI,
University of Bologna, Viale del Risorgimento, 2, 40132 Bologna, Italy
3
Physics Dept., Univ. Bucharest, P.O. Box MG-11, 077125 Bucharest, Romania

(Received 18 November 2013; accepted 13 January 2014; published online 27 January 2014)
We present a study for a THz receiver based on graphene. First, the dipole and the bowtie THz
antennas on graphene are designed, and followed by the on-wafer fabrication of a graphene diode
matched to the antenna. Finally the responsivity of the receiver up to 10 THz is computed. Our
results show that the antenna and the diode behaviors exhibit new properties (e.g., the antennas are
acting as high reactive impedance surfaces, the diode is rectifying only due to its geometrical
shape). These new properties are due to the physical properties of graphene having the carrier
C 2014 AIP Publishing LLC.
transport described by Dirac equation. V
[http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4863305]

I. INTRODUCTION 60.04 V/W at 0.3 THz. Could we increase the responsivity

by 3 orders of magnitude to be comparable with that of THz
As terahertz (THz) technology has attained maturity,
Schottky diodes and could we extend the working frequency
THz spectroscopy, imaging, and other various applications
30 times to reach 10 THz?
have grown considerably in the last decade. THz spectrome-
The answer is affirmative and is detailed in the present
ters and imaging systems are the main techniques of THz
paper. Such enhancement in the THz domain is possible by a
technology and have numerous applications, ranging from
deep understanding of the physical properties of graphene,
explosive and concealed weapon detection up to biomolecule
which are further used to build new antennas and diodes
detection, pharmacy, and medical applications.1
with properties, which do not exist in THz semiconducting
However, THz devices are still the subject of intensive
devices.
research involving the most advanced micro-nanoelectronics
materials and devices, such as plasma channel field-effect- II. THz ANTENNAS ON A MONOLAYER GRAPHENE
transistors (FETs),2 Si FETs,3 mesocrystal microspheres,4 ACTING AS A HIGH REACTIVE SURFACE
quantum cascade lasers,5 and graphene.6 In spite of these
efforts, the miniaturization of THz circuits and devices The conductivity in graphene has two components:
remains a problem. For instance, THz imaging is difficult intraband and interband conductivities10
since a single detector is scanning the entire image and the
image acquisition data rate is slow, but electro-absorption r ¼ rintra þ rinter : (1)
modulators based on graphene as electrically reconfigurable
patterns for THz cameras are investigated and promise fast The intraband term is given by
data acquisition.7
The latest new material in the quest of miniaturized THz rintra ¼ ie2 kB T=ph2 ðx  i2CÞ
devices is graphene, because of its high mobility, in the  fðlc =kB TÞ þ 2 ln½expðlc =kB TÞ þ 1g; (2)
range of 10 000–100 000 cm2/V s, and of its high mean-free
carrier path, of 400 nm up to 1 lm at room temperature when
where lc ffi eaVb is the chemical potential, with a a
encapsulated with a hexagonal boron nitride substrate8 that
geometry-dependent constant and Vb the bias voltage (a
matches the graphene lattice. Even for unmatched substrates,
value of 0.13 eV was chosen for lc in the simulations), T is
like SiO2, the graphene mobility is in the range of
the temperature, set at 300 K, and C ¼ 0:11 meV. The intra-
9000–15 000 cm2/V s, much higher than that of Si.9 So, it is
band term dominates the graphene conductivity over an
expected that ballistic transport in graphene-based devices
ultrawideband of frequencies, from DC up to 1 THz,11 the
plays a key role in THz electronics. Despite recent progress,
real part of the intraband conductivity being much larger
graphene devices have not attained their ultimate perform-
than the imaginary part in this frequency range.
ance in the THz domain. For example, the recently reported
On the contrary, in the range of 1–30 THz, the interband
graphene THz receiver6 has a responsivity of only
conductivity
 
2 2jlc j  hðx  i2CÞ
a)
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed. Electronic mail: rinter ¼ iðe =4phÞln (3)
[email protected] 2jlc j þ hðx  2iC

0021-8979/2014/115(4)/044307/7/$30.00 115, 044307-1 C 2014 AIP Publishing LLC

V

[This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AIP content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation.aip.org/termsconditions. Downloaded to ] IP:
193.231.133.66 On: Wed, 11 Jun 2014 09:12:24
 044307-2 Dragoman et al. J. Appl. Phys. 115, 044307 (2014)

is dominating,11 its real part being much smaller than its In Fig. 2, we illustrate the configuration of a gold THz
imaginary part. dipole antenna over a graphene monolayer deposited on
Although the interband conductivity is much larger than Si/SiO2, where the SiO2 layer has a thickness of 300 nm. The
the intraband conductivity in the THz range, both terms were length of the dipole is L ¼ 0.38k0 ¼ 11.25 lm, its width is
taken into account for the calculation of the surface impedance W ¼ 1 lm, the gap is of 100 nm, and the gold thickness is
200 nm. We have to point out that nowadays 4 in. wafers of gra-
ZS ðVb Þ ¼ 1=rðxÞ ¼ Rs ðVb Þ þ jXs ðVb Þ: (4) phene monolayers chemical vapour deposition (CVD) grown on
Si/SiO2 are commercially available. The real and imaginary
The simulation results, illustrated in Fig. 1, show that the parts of the input impedance of the THz dipole on graphene,
surface impedance is predominantly reactive (inductive), Rs obtained using the complex conductivity of gold in the THz
having values below 52 X, while Xs  Rs attains 17–18 kX. region from Ref. 13, are displayed in Figs. 3(a) and 3(b), respec-
This means that graphene is a high reactive impedance tively. The simulations show that there are 8–9 frequency points,
surface (RIS), which is able to reduce the lateral lobes, to where the imaginary part is zero, points which allow perfect
enhance the front-to-back ratio of radiated power, to mini- matching according to the RIS theory,12 and an entire frequency
mize the coupling between antenna and its image, to achieve region existing over which the imaginary part is small.
impedance matching in possibly a wider band and to assure The radiation pattern at the frequency of 10 THz was com-
antenna miniaturization.12 Moreover, since both conductivity puted via Computer Simulation Technology (CST)–microwave
components depend on an applied DC electric field, the sur- studio, and is displayed in Fig. 4. We see from this figure that
face impedance can be modified by changing this field, gra- the radiation pattern has a high front-to-back ratio of radiated
phene being a natural tunable high RIS. power and no side lobes. The directivity of the antenna is of 6
dBi and its total efficiency is almost 15%, as can be seen from
the inset in Fig. 4. The efficiency can attain 82% if antenna
matching is improved. This is a remarkable result at such a
huge frequency of 10 THz.
In Fig. 5, we have modeled another configuration of a
THz antenna on graphene: a gold bowtie antenna with
L ¼ 0.76k0 ¼ 22.25 lm, W ¼ 13 lm, a gap of 100 nm, and
gold thickness of 200 nm. The real and imaginary parts of
the input impedance are represented in Figs. 6(a) and 6(b).
We can see that, in contrast to the dipole impedance, zero
values of the imaginary part of input impedance appear only
at a smaller number of points (3 in Fig. 6(b)), at frequencies
larger than 10.5 THz. From the radiation pattern at 10 THz
illustrated in Fig. 7, it follows that the radiation efficiency
reaches 33%, the directivity being of about 8 dBi. Although
it is well known that the bowtie antenna has two lobes, a sin-
gle lobe with a high directivity, able to collimate alone the
THz radiation without any lens, is evident from the

FIG. 1. The surface impedance of graphene in the range of 1–30 THz. FIG. 2. The configuration of THz dipole on graphene.

[This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AIP content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation.aip.org/termsconditions. Downloaded to ] IP:
193.231.133.66 On: Wed, 11 Jun 2014 09:12:24
 044307-3 Dragoman et al. J. Appl. Phys. 115, 044307 (2014)

FIG. 3. The input impedance of the

THz dipole antenna on graphene: (a)
real part and (b) imaginary part.

FIG. 4. The radiation pattern of the THz dipole antenna.

[This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AIP content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation.aip.org/termsconditions. Downloaded to ] IP:
193.231.133.66 On: Wed, 11 Jun 2014 09:12:24
 044307-4 Dragoman et al. J. Appl. Phys. 115, 044307 (2014)

input impedance decrease if we increase Rs via a DC voltage,

such that the radiation efficiency decreases. On the contrary,
when Xs increases, the real and imaginary parts of the input
impedance become almost constant over the entire THz fre-
quency range the antenna can be easily matched, its radiation
efficiency increases and the back-radiation is always negligi-
ble, with no side lobes. It thus becomes possible to match
antenna with a rectifying diode positioned at its end by
changing the DC voltage on the antenna.

III. A THz RECEIVER ON GRAPHENE

The next device needed for a THz receiver is a graphene
rectifier. The graphene monolayer rectifier is schematically
represented in Fig. 8(a), while a scanning electron micro-
scope (SEM) photo of the fabricated device is shown in Fig.
8(b). This geometrically rectifying graphene diode works up
to 20–30 THz, the theoretical analysis of this diode being al-
ready reported in Ref. 14. In this paper, we report the fabri-
FIG. 5. The configuration of the THz bowtie antenna on graphene. cation of the graphene diode with a length of around 100 nm,
so that it is able to work in the ballistic regime at room tem-
simulation in Fig. 7. This dramatic change in the radiation perature. The theoretical I  V dependence of the graphene
pattern is due to the RIS surface-like behavior of graphene. diode was calculated using the Landauer formula14 and was
More computational experiments, not shown here, found by dividing the total area of the diode in a certain
reveal the fact that both the real and imaginary parts of the number of regions (see Fig. 8(a)), solving the Dirac equation

FIG. 6. The input impedance of the

bowtie antenna: (a) real part and (b)
imaginary part.

[This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AIP content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation.aip.org/termsconditions. Downloaded to ] IP:
193.231.133.66 On: Wed, 11 Jun 2014 09:12:24
 044307-5 Dragoman et al. J. Appl. Phys. 115, 044307 (2014)

FIG. 7. The radiation pattern of the

bowtie antenna.

FIG. 8. The THz graphene geometric

diode: (a) diode schematics and (b)
SEM photo of the diode (the bar scale
is 100 nm).

[This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AIP content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation.aip.org/termsconditions. Downloaded to ] IP:
193.231.133.66 On: Wed, 11 Jun 2014 09:12:24
 044307-6 Dragoman et al. J. Appl. Phys. 115, 044307 (2014)

in each region and imposing the continuity conditions at

each interface for the spinorial solutions of the Dirac equa-
tion. It was found that the diode has a certain region of width
phvF =dout , with vF the Fermi velocity in graphene, where the
current is nearly zero. So, the diode is rectifying in this
region and its I  V characteristic is strongly dependent on
the Fermi energy, which can be tuned by a gate voltage.
We fabricated the geometric diode on a graphene mono-
layer wafer deposited on a 4 in. wafer purchased from
Graphene Supermarket. The graphene monolayer is grown
by CVD and is deposited on 285 nm of SiO2 grown on
p-doped Si. Raman spectroscopy was used to map the gra-
phene area and to identify the eventual cracks, and the gra-
phene bilayer, trilayer, and multilayer regions. We have
discovered that 80% of the graphene wafer area consists of
graphene monolayers. The regions where graphene mono-
layers were not present were marked by e-beam lithography,
this procedure allowing the fabrication of tens of graphene
diodes on the same wafer. Subsequently, poly(methyl meth-
acrylate) termed as PMMA 950 K Az was spin coated over
the graphene wafer at 3000 rpm with a thickness of 70 nm,
the geometrical diode was further patterned with an e-beam
tool-Raith e-Line, and a RIE equipment was used to cut the
graphene in trapezoidal shapes. Then, the PMMA coating
and e-beam lithography were again employed to obtain the
metallic contact patterning. The metal deposition was done
in a highly directional e-gun evaporation chamber
(Temescal) and the lift-off process was performed in ace-
tone. The SEM photo in Fig. 8(b) shows a graphene diode
with a length of 100 nm, a shoulder of din ¼ 100 nm and a
neck of only dout ¼ 30 nm. We have used a Keithley 4200 to
measure several diodes on the same wafer, as illustrated in FIG. 9. The I-V measurement: (a) set-up and (b) measurement results.
Fig. 9(a). A typical I  V dependence is presented in Fig.
9(b). A region of about 140 mV around 0 V exists where the can now simulate an entire THz receiver on graphene. For
current is very small. We have applied a gate voltage and this purpose, we have used the NONLIN software developed
have observed that at small gate voltages (610 V) the current by the University of Bologna using harmonic balance techni-
is increasing, but the region where the current is zero is pre- ques. The NONLIN model takes into account the Norton cur-
served, but at high gate voltages (40 V to 60 V) the cur- rent source Jeq , equivalent to the incident EM field, using the
rent is almost linear and shows a saturation region, the I  V reciprocity theorem of electromagnetic fields. The admit-
dependence being similar to that of a FET. The results in tance matrix YA ðxÞ of the considered antenna is used all
Fig. 9(b) show that it is possible to build a graphene mono- over the THz frequency range. An inductance of 1 lH is
layer FET with a bandgap. The value bandgap of this FET is used inside the circuit topology to simulate a filter that
about 140 meV corresponding with the zero current region of avoids a high-frequency output power. The graphene diode
the diode. This effect was also used in other paper to open a is modeled as a voltage-dependent current source (whose
bandgap in graphene monolayer FET.15 The saturation equation is given by the Landauer formula) in parallel with a
region occurs because large gate voltages produce large den- (static) junction capacitance CJ of 1 aF. The load is consid-
sities of carriers, but only a limited number of carriers can ered to be 50 X. The modeling structure of the THz receiver
flow through the neck of the diode, which is very small on graphene is shown in Fig. 10(a), while its responsivity is
(30 nm is about 300 atoms in width), and thus the current is represented in Fig. 10(b) when the input power is 1 lW and
saturated. The disappearance of the rectifying region at large the back gate is 20 V. Under these working conditions we
gate voltages can be attributed to the progressive decrease of obtain an almost constant responsivity over the THz fre-
the mean-free path as the carrier concentration and their quency range up to 10 THz, of about 21.33 V/W, with a
energy increase, which can lead to non-ballistic transport at small relative peak of 21.4 V/W at 5 THz. This THz respon-
large gate voltages. When the back gate is 60 V, the current sivity is orders of magnitude larger than the present state-of-
at 0 V is 0.2 nA, while at þ1 V increases about 8  103 times the-art values of THz receivers based on graphene.
and reaches 15 lA, which is a remarkably large current for A final issue that we address is the matching problem of
such a small device. the diode with the antenna, taking into account that the series
Using the gold antennas on graphene described in the resistance is around 64 kX. Such a matching can, indeed, be
previous section and the graphene diode described above, we achieved, because also the dipole on graphene has a large

[This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AIP content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation.aip.org/termsconditions. Downloaded to ] IP:
193.231.133.66 On: Wed, 11 Jun 2014 09:12:24
 044307-7 Dragoman et al. J. Appl. Phys. 115, 044307 (2014)

IV. CONCLUSIONS
The paper has demonstrated that antennas on graphene
behave very differently at THz frequencies compared to THz
antennas on semiconductors. Graphene behaves like a RIS
and, as a consequence, antennas on graphene are more effi-
cient at THz frequencies. The ballistic diode is rectifying
only due to its shape and its I-V dependence can be con-
trolled by a back-gate voltage. The direct THz receiver on
graphene formed by the antenna, matching circuit, and the
diode is working with a responsivity of 21.33 V/W up to 10
THz. These results show that integrated circuits at very high
frequencies can be fabricated on graphene.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We thank the European Commission for the financial

support via the FP 7 NANO RF (grant agreement 318352).

1
J. Federici and L. Moeler, “Review of terahertz and subterahertz wireless
communications,” J. Appl. Phys. 107, 111101 (2010).
2
W. Knap, S. Rumyantsev, M. S. Vitiello, D. Coquillat, S. Blin, N.
Dyakonova, M. Shur, F. Teppe, A. Tredicucci, and T. Hagarsua,
“Nanometer size field effect transistors for terahertz detectors,”
Nanotechnology 24, 214002 (2013).
3 €
D. Glaab, S. Boppel, A. Lisauskas, U. Pfeiffer, E. Ojerfors, and H. G.
Roskos, “Terahertz heterodyne detection with silicon field transistors,”
Appl. Phys. Lett. 96, 042106 (2010).
4
X. L. Wu, S. J. Xiong, Z. Liu, J. Chen, J. C. Shen, T. H. Li, P. H. Wu, and
FIG. 10. (a) The simulated structure of the THz receiver on graphene and P. K. Chu, “Green light stimulated terahertz emission, from mesocrystal
(b) its responsivity. microspheres,” Nature Nanotechnol. 6, 103–106 (2011).
5
M. C. Wanke, E. W. Young, C. D. Norquist, M. J. Cich, A. D. Grine, C. T.
Fuller, J. L. Reno, and M. Lee, “Monolithically integrated solid-state tera-
hertz transceivers,” Nat. Photonics 4, 565–569 (2010).
6
L. Vicarelli, M. S. Vitiello, D. Coquillat, A. Lombardo, A. C. Ferrari, W.
Knap, M. Polini, V. Pellegrini, and A. Trediccuci, “Graphene field-effect
transistors as room temperature terahertz detectors,” Nature Mater. 11,
865–871 (2012).
7
B. Sensale-Rodriguez, S. Rafique, R. Yan, M. Zhu, V. Protasenko, D.
Jena, L. Liu, and H. G. Xing, “Terahertz imaging employing graphene
modulator arrays,” Opt. Express 21, 2324–2330 (2013).
8
A. S. Mayorov, R. V. Gorbachev, S. V. Morozov, L. Britnell, R. Jail, L. A.
Ponomarenko, K. S. Novoselov, K. Watanabe, T. Taniguchi, and A. K.
Geim, “Micrometer-scale ballistic transport in encapsulated graphene at
room temperature,” Nano Lett. 11, 2396–2399 (2011).
9
J.-H. Chen, C. Jang, S. Xiao, M. Ishigami, and M. S. Fuhrer, “Intrinsic and
extrinsic performance limits of graphene devices on SiO2,” Nature
Nanotechnol. 3, 206 (2008).
10
G. W. Hanson, “Dyadic Green’s function and guided surface waves for a
surface conductivity model of graphene,” J. Appl. Phys. 103, 064302
(2008).
11
FIG. 11. S11 dependence on frequency, showing the matching between the B. S. Rodrıguez, R. Yen, L. Liu, D. Jena, and H. G. Xiang, “Graphene for
graphene diode and the antenna. reconfigurable terahertz optoelectronics,” Proc. IEEE 101, 1705–1716
(2013).
12
H. Mosallaei and K. Sarabandi, “Antenna miniaturization and bandwidth
reactive part, of the order 5 kX–10 kX. To match the graphene enhancement using a reactive impedance substrate,” IEEE Trans.
dipole antenna and the diode around 8–10 THz we need very Antennas Propag. 52, 2403–2414 (2004).
13
small transmission lines for the two parallel inductances of M. A. Ordal, L. L. Long, R. J. Bell, S. E. Bell, R. R. Bell, R. W.
Alexander, Jr., and C. A. Ward, “Optical properties of the metals Al, Co,
0.5 nH connected to antenna, ended by a capacitor of 0.5 fF, Cu, Au, Fe, Pb, Ni, Pd, Pt, Ag, Ti, and W in the infrared and far infrared,”
which in turn is in parallel with the 64 kX diode. We have Appl. Opt. 22, 1099–1120 (1983).
14
represented in Fig. 11 the S11 parameter at the diode output D. Dragoman and M. Dragoman, “Geometrical-induced rectification in
two-dimensional ballistic nanodevices,” J. Phys. D 46, 055306 (2013).
and it can be seen that at 8.1 THz and 8.8 THz we obtain a 15
Y. Lu, B. Goldsmith, D. R. Strachan, J. H. Lim, Z. Luo, and A. T. C.
very good reflection coefficient of 13.3 dB (voltage standing Johnson, “High on-off ration graphene nanoconstriction filed effect tran-
wave ratio ¼ 1.53). sistor,” Small 6, 2748–2754 (2010).

[This article is copyrighted as indicated in the article. Reuse of AIP content is subject to the terms at: http://scitation.aip.org/termsconditions. Downloaded to ] IP:
193.231.133.66 On: Wed, 11 Jun 2014 09:12:24