MONOLITHIC OPTOELECTRONIC TRANSISTOR - A NEW SMART-PIXEL DEVICE

A new optical switching and logic device, the monolithic optoelectroni c transistor (MOET), is demonstrated. The MOET is an integrated circui t consisting of a p-i-n photodiode, a resonant tunneling diode, a mult iple-quantum-well modulator, and a field-effect transistor. The device can function as an optical inverter or NOR gate. Present devices swit ch at an input optical power of 12.5 muW and have a large-signal optic al gain exceeding ten. The advantages of the MOET include abrupt switc hing thresholds, saturated ''on'' and ''off'' states, and nonlatching operation.