Abstract

Short electrical pulses have conventionally been generated with photoconductive switches on short carrier lifetime material such as low temperature grown GaAs. Another approach is nonuniform illumination of a photoconductive switch.^1,2 Both methods yield electrical pulse widths of less than 1 ps. The first method, however, is usually not compatible with active devices on the same wafer. The disadvantage of the second method is that the generated pulse forms are difficult to reproduce.

© 1994 IEEE