Miniature Quartz Resonator Thermal Detector

Abstract

This work describes the results of recent attempts to realise the potential performance of a 20Ox200pm square 10 pm thick quartz resonator operating at 100 MHz as a thermal infrared detector. The feasibility of small gold grid electrodes has been demonstrated, which together with a Ni/Cr structure should provide high infrared absorption. Reduction of the presently high frequency fluctuation noise will be necessary to achieve performance close to the background limit.