Advanced Semiconductor Devices and Systems Lab

Our lab aims for advanced semiconductor devices/sensors and systems thereof. Our research interests include spanned from photodiodes/photodetectors to single-photon detectors/sensors, concentrating since 2006 on CMOS-compatible avalanche photodetectors (CMOS-APDs), single-photon avalanche diodes (SPADs), and silicon photomultipliers (SiPMs), along with their applications(e.g., LiDAR (light detection and ranging), dToF (direct time of flight), 3D vision, biophotonics, quantum photonics, space, security, silicon photonics, optical interconnects, etc.).

We are currently focusing more on the research and development of high-performance SPAD/SiPM/APD detectors/sensors for next-generation applications like:

(i) LiDAR/ToF sensors & applications: ADAS (advanced driver assistance systems), eventually for autonomous vehicles, robots, physical AI, drones, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), submarine/airborne/satellite LiDAR, machine vision, industrial automation, etc. and mobile devices for 3D face/gesture recognition/tracking, depth imaging, biometric authentication, AR/VR/MR/XR (augmented/virtual/mixed/extended reality), etc.

(ii) Biomedical applications: TOF PET (time-of-flight positron emission tomography), X-ray, SPECT (single-photon emission computed tomography), FLIM (fluorescence-lifetime imaging microscopy), super-resolution microscopy, NIRI (near-infrared imaging), PCR (polymerase-chain-reaction), ELISA (enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay), etc.

(iii) Safety and security: Night vision, low-light imaging, security cameras, radiation detectors, gamma cameras, dosimeters, cargo scanners, environmental monitoring, etc. 

(iv) Quantum applications: Integrated photonic quantum technology, Integrated photonic quantum detector, QKD (quantum key distribution), quantum communication, QRNG (quantum random number generators), quantum cryptography, optical quantum computing, etc.

(v) Optical interconnect applications: Silicon photonics, CPO (co-packaged optics), interconnects for GPU clusters, AI data centers, and computer clusters, etc.

More sensing/imaging applications, wherever single-photon sensitivity and high precision time-of-arrival detection are critical, and interconnect/communication applications, wherever higher bandwidth and sensitivity are important.