Mid-infrared system utilizing LEVEl-crossing chirp-Spectroscopy in Quantum Cascade Lasers

The goal of the project is to develop a novel Mid-IR compact process monitoring system for in-situ process monitoring in the semiconductor industry, plasma process diagnostics, environmental and exhaust gas monitoring. Its core constitutes a cost-efficient Fabry-Perot cavity quantum cascade laser (FP-QCL) provided by Alpes with an innovative, ground-breaking approach for tailored chirped emission, yielding a 20 cm-1 spectral tuning range at one of the targeted wavelengths at 4.5, 7.5 or 9.7 μm with the output power of 50 mW.

The new device avoids additional expensive epitaxy steps in the fabrication process, tolerates higher output powers in the Mid-IR spectral range and offers an order of magnitude wider spectral tuning range. 

The main targeted application, the in-situ monitoring of semiconductor production processes, has a worldwide significance. An emanation into other application domains of the gas sensing and Mid-IR spectroscopy such as medical breath analysis and water quality monitoring sectors is expected in the future.