Xiubao SUI^*, Qian CHEN, Guohua GU, and Ning LIU

National Defense Key Laboratory of Optoelectronic Engineering, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, Nanjing 210094, China

(Received February 26, 2010; Accepted September 3, 2010)

There are certain limitations in the application of uncooled focal plane array (FPA) detectors owing to the shortage of the response model that transforms bias voltage to analog output voltage at a certain constant radiation power; Moreover, bias voltage affects the input radiation gain. In this study, we established a response model of a microbolometer through examining the detection theory of a microbolometer and the heat balance equation under the condition of the pulse voltage bias. In the establishment process, we simplified the heat balance equation in order to acquire a simple answer. The experimental data show that, in the full variable range of bias voltages, the biggest difference between the model data and the experiment data is about 0.7 K. This model can reflect the real responses of microbolometers with only small differences, which are acceptable in engineering applications.

Key words: resistance-type microbolometer, detection principle, response model, capacitive transimpedance amplifier (CTIA)

^*E-mail address: sxbhandsome@163.com