Nanoplasmonic terahertz photoconductive switch on GaAs.

Low-temperature (LT) grown GaAs has a subpicosecond carrier response time that makes it favorable for terahertz photoconductive (PC) switching. However, this is obtained at the price of lower mobility and lower thermal conductivity than GaAs. Here we demonstrate subpicosecond carrier sweep-out and over an order of magnitude higher sensitivity in detection from a GaAs-based PC switch by using a nanoplasmonic structure. As compared to a conventional GaAs PC switch, we observe 40 times the peak-to-peak response from the nanoplasmonic structure on GaAs. The response is double that of a commercial, antireflection coated LT-GaAs PC switch.