Room temperature platinum nano-strip bolometer for mm & submm-wave applications

We demonstrate a W-band bolometer based on a platinum nano-strip which is integrated with a waveguide probe on a polymer substrate. We measure a high thermal response of 49000 K/W thanks to the small size of the Pt resistor and the thermal properties of the polymer. Furthermore, its small thermal capacity allows to decrease the time constant to 2.2 ms. A good matching in the entire W-band is achieved by a careful design of the probe. The linearity of the bolometer is demonstrated over 4 decades of RF power. As it is based on traditional microelectronic fabrication techniques, all dimensions of the circuit can be easily reduced to design full-band bolometers for smaller waveguides and higher frequency band up to the THz.