Cette thèse présente la conception, la caractérisation et l’utilisation d’un microsystème intégrant des fonctions terahertz (THz) guidées. L'interprétation des mesures conduit à la définition d'une métrologie des liquides aux fréquences THz.Ceci est possible par le développement de systèmes robustes, versatiles et sensibles couplant circuits microfluidiques et guides d’ondes THz intégrés. La création d'un procédé technologique compatible avec les processus microélectroniques de fabrication en « salle blanche », et le choix d’une filière silicium/polymère/verre ont permis d’obtenir une résistance à des pressions de plus de 35bar dans des canaux de 50µm de large. De plus, l’assemblage des substrats en amont de la gravure des canaux permet une conception indépendante des circuits électromagnétique et fluidique avec une définition de motifs inégalée pour ce type de microsystèmes. Les mesures réalisées avec ce dispositif ont permis d’atteindre une sensibilité aux protéines de l’ordre de 5mg/mL, état de l’art des dispositifs THz conventionnels, améliorant notablement les performances des dispositifs microfluidiques THz. Cette sensibilité a permis la caractérisation de l’hydratation de protéines en solution. Les calibrations in-situ, assurant l'obtention de mesures quantitatives, permettent d'atteindre leur nombre d’hydratation. Le couplage des mesures avec des techniques de chimiométrie conduit à l’analyse plus fondamentale de la structure et la dynamique de la couche d’hydratation, confrontée avec succès à des modèles numériques. Nous aboutissons à la définition d'un laboratoire sur puce, couplant modélisation, mesures calibrées et interprétation statistique dans le spectre THz, qui par ses caractéristiques propres, contribue à la compréhension des phénomènes d'hydratation. Le véritable apport de cette technologie réside dans ses perspectives pour le suivi des interactions dynamiques nécessaire à une meilleure compréhension du vivant. / This work presents the conception, characterization and use of a microfluidic microsystem dedicated to liquid metrology at THz frequencies. First part focuses on developing a versatile and sensitive microsystem, co-integrating microfluidic and THz integrated functions. A glass/polymer/silicon technological process (clean-room process) has been developed and leads to a robust microfluidic network, where 35bar pressures can be reached without leakage. Since wafer bonding is performed before microchannel etching, a strong versatility is obtained for the microsystem conception. Indeed, microfluidic and electromagnetic circuits can be modified independently without changing technological process parameters. Measurements with the microsystem have shown that a 5mg/mL sensitivity is obtained for protein solutions, which is about the state of the art of conventional THz spectroscopy and which increases performances of THz integrated systems. This sensitivity enables to quantify hydration around soluted proteins by computing their hydration number. Moreover, ethanol/water mixtures measurements with the microsystem coupled with chemometrics analysis leads to a better understanding of hydration phenomenon. Dynamics and structure of hydration shells have been characterized in good agreement with Molecular Dynamics models. Thus, the developed microsystem permits a quantitative analysis of liquids in the THz spectrum, dedicated to dynamics interaction understanding in biological processes.

The terahertz (THz) spectral range is devoid of commercially feasible radiation sources, detectors, and components. In particular, THz sources are bulky, complex to operate, and cost-prohibitive - more suited for a research laboratory than a commercial setting. Developing compact and mass-producible sources in the 1 to 6 THz spectral range will open up new avenues for this technology to make a mainstream societal impact. The focus of this thesis is the development of compact, room-temperature terahertz sources based on quantum cascade lasers (QCL) and quantum well technology. QCLs are semiconductor lasers that operate with high power at mid-infrared (mid-IR) and THz frequencies. THz QCLs are the only mW-level average power sources with spectral coverage from 0.8 to 5 THz. However they only work at cryogenic temperatures because they cannot maintain population inversion across the lasing transition at elevated temperatures. Cryogenic cooling makes these sources cumbersome to operate and expensive to manufacture. Room-temperature operation significantly enhances their commercial appeal and a portion of this dissertation investigated the improvement in THz QCL temperature performance using GaAs-Al₀.₁₅Ga₀.₈₅As double-phonon resonant active region designs. These devices worked up to 173 K and were a substantial improvement compared to prior implementations of double-phonon resonant designs. Room-temperature THz sources that do not require population inversion across the lasing transition can be engineered by combining the field of nonlinear optics with intersubband transitions in quantum well structures. One method of creating inversionless THz lasing is based upon the principle of Raman gain in semiconductors and this thesis explores the design of an intersubband Raman laser (IRL) with GaAs-Al₀.₃₃Ga₀.₆₇As heterostructures. The primary focus of this dissertation is developing room-temperature, broadly-tunable, monolithic THz sources based on difference-frequency generation (DFG) in mid-IR QCLs. The source active region is quantum-engineered to provide lasing at mid-IR frequencies, ω₁ and ω₂, and simultaneously have giant second-order optical nonlinearity for THz generation at frequency ω [subscript THz]=ω₁–ω₂. This dissertation developed a Cherenkov emission scheme that produced devices with a narrow emission linewidth, 0.12 mW peak power and tuning from 1.55 to 5.7 THz - the largest tuning bandwidth compared to semiconductor technology of similar size and cost. / text

In this thesis, novel broadband waveguides capable of operating at terahertz (THz) frequencies are introduced. We explore in detail the two-wire waveguide showing that it can have absorption as low as 0.01 cm-1, fairly good coupling efficiency, and is free from group-velocity dispersion (GVD). We also propose two low loss, planar slot-line structures for guiding THz waves. Rigorous theoretical analyses, numerical simulations, and experimental results are presented to evaluate and verify the performance of the waveguides at THz frequencies. We also present a tapered structure to couple effectively THz waves from a photoconductive source to a two-wire waveguide. Finally, practical structures to realize the first THz low-loss cable using the two-wire waveguide are introduced. / Graduate

Huang, Shengyang. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 100-108). / Electronic reproduction. Hong Kong : Chinese University of Hong Kong, [2012] System requirements: Adobe Acrobat Reader. Available via World Wide Web. / Abstract also in Chinese.

La tomographie et ses algorithmes associés sont désormais bien connus dans le domaine des rayons X. En revanche tous ces outils s’appuient sur une modélisation qui diffère de celle qui pourrait être envisagée dans le domaine des ondes Térahertz (THz). On retrouve, dans l’état de l’art, des modèles de propagation de l’onde THz au sein d’un objet. Ces modèles génèrent une onde THz qui est soit éloigné d’une vérité terrain, soit d’une complexité algorithmique trop élevée pour être utilisée au sein d’une reconstruction tomographique dans des temps de calcul acceptables. Un des objectifs de ce travail de thèse est donc d’obtenir un modèle de propagation de l’onde THz permettant une meilleure modélisation du processus d’acquisition et pouvant être calculé dans des temps relativement courts. Lors de la mesure d’une projection d’un objet, le phénomène d’absorption n’est pas le seul phénomène responsable de l’atténuation de l’onde THz. Les phénomènes de réfraction et de réflexion sont aussi responsables d’une atténuation de l’onde THz mesurée. Lors d’une reconstruction tomographique THz, si ces phénomènes ne sont pas pris en compte, l’algorithme attribue cette atténuation au phénomène d’absorption. Cela se traduit par une reconstruction des coefficients d’absorption de l’objet éloignée de leur valeur réelle. Sous l’effet de ces phénomènes, le problème de la reconstruction tomographique THz est non linéaire. Cela empêche ainsi l’utilisation directe des méthodes de reconstruction classiques puisque ces méthodes impliquent que la relation liant un objet à ses projections soit linéaire. / Tomography and its associated algorithms are now well known in the field of X-rays. On the other hand, all these tools are based on a modeling that differs from which could be envisaged in the field of Terahertz (THz) waves. We find, in the state of the art, models of propagation of the THz wave within an object. These models generate a THz wave that is either far from a ground truth, or of an algorithmic complexity that is too high to be used within a tomographic reconstruction in acceptable computing times. One of the objectives of this thesis work is therefore to obtain a propagation model of the THz wave allowing better modeling of the acquisition process and which can be calculated in relatively short times. When measuring the projection of an object, the absorption phenomenon is not the only phenomenon responsible for the attenuation of the THz wave. The phenomena of refraction and reflection are also responsible for attenuation of the measured THz wave. During a THz tomographic reconstruction, if these phenomena are not taken into account, the algorithm attributes this attenuation to the absorption phenomenon. This results in a reconstruction of the absorption coefficients of the object far from their real value. Under the effect of these phenomena, the problem of THz tomographic reconstruction is non-linear. This prevents the direct use of classical reconstruction methods since these methods imply that the relationship between an object and its projections is linear.

No description available.

Thesis (M.S. in Physics)--Naval Postgraduate School, December 2008. / Thesis Advisor(s): Borden, Brett. "December 2008." Description based on title screen as viewed on January 29, 2009. Includes bibliographical references (p. 83-84). Also available in print.

The acceleration of charged particles with ultrafast terahertz electromagnetic radiation could enable new, and improve many of aspects of, accelerator applications. These include providing shorter electron bunches for ultrafast time-resolved pump-probe spectroscopy, enabling complex longitudinal profiles to be imparted onto charged particle bunches and significantly improving the ability to synchronise an accelerator to an external laser. In this thesis I present investigations into terahertz radiation sources that enabled the generation of terahertz radiation with attractive properties for accelerator based applications. Specific attention has been paid to temporally tunable sources that generate strong longitudinally polarised electric field components as these enable a free-space co-linear interaction geometry to be implemented. A simulation describing the propagation of radiation from such sources has been developed. Terahertz sources have been designed and the radiation generated characterised via electro optic detection. These include a radially biased photoconductive antenna (PCA) based source of which the longitudinally polarised terahertz electric field component was found to have an amplitude of 2.22 kVcm-1 as well as a near-single cycle temporal profile. This radially biased PCA was used in conjunction with the Accelerators and Lasers in Combined Experiments (ALICE) energy recovery linear accelerator at the Daresbury Laboratory in an electron acceleration experiment. To enable higher longitudinally polarised terahertz electric field strengths to be obtained, as well as the ability to temporally tune the terahertz radiation, generation within non-linear optical crystals was investigated. Magnesium-oxide doped stoichiometric lithium niobate (MgO:SLN) was investigated as a possible candidate due to its high non-linear susceptibility tensor and reported ability to impose temporal tuning directly from the pump laser beam. A scheme consisting of two MgO:SLN crystals each generating a separate linear polarised terahertz pulse which were then combined via a lens was designed and built. Electro optic detection techniques were used to characterise the radiation generated from this source. Peak terahertz electric fields amplitudes of 11.6 kVcm-1 and 47 kVcm-1 were measured for both the longitudinally and transversely polarised field components respectively. Temporal profiles measured from both the longitudinally and transversely polarised electric field components showed electric field periods of approximately 300 fs. This method of generating terahertz radiation employed a pulse-front tilt technique. Allowing for the same scaling as recently reported in the literature for MgO:SLN generation techniques, which will in principle allow this method to scale to longitudinally polarised terahertz electric field profiles in excess of 1 MVcm-1.

No description available.

ITC/USA 2009 Conference Proceedings / The Forty-Fifth Annual International Telemetering Conference and Technical Exhibition / October 26-29, 2009 / Riviera Hotel & Convention Center, Las Vegas, Nevada / Recent development of sources and detectors in the THz regime (300 GHz to 3 THz) has enabled the precise measurement of material properties, including complex refractive indexes and loss tangents. Using our developed THz spectrometer, new data, in particular, of biological tissues has been used to develop potential THz medical imaging applications. In this paper, an overview of a 0.1-3 THz, with sub-GHz resolution spectroscopy system is presented that has been designed in particular to measure biological samples and provide data that will used to determine initial viability of THz medical imaging applications.