Ultrafast sampling using low temperature grown GaAs MSM switches integrated with CMOS amplifier for photonic A/D conversion

Summary form only given. In our system, we utilize an optically triggered, electrical sample and hold scheme with low temperature (LT) grown GaAs MSM switches. The switch is attached to a transmission line and samples the input electrical signal onto a hold capacitor when optically activated by a short-pulse laser. An electrical A/D converter then digitizes the held signal. By time-interleaving a number of these channels, the aggregate sampling rate of the system is increased, with the larger bandwidth requirements being placed on the input sample and hold. In this work, we demonstrate LT GaAs MSM switches integrated with a front-end CMOS buffer amplifier stage with linear sampling capability from dc to 20 GHz input frequency. To our knowledge, this represents the highest bandwidth of any integrated system with CMOS technology.