Analytical Instrument World's 'Golden Eyes'

In general, the development of analytical instruments can be divided into two types: first, analysis of the instrument itself, internal development, and second, the development of analytical instruments driven by the development of analytical instrument-related devices. Optical detectors are the "eyes" of spectroscopic scientific instruments. They are the core and key components for collecting signals and for signal conversion. Their development has played a huge role in the development of the analytical instrument industry.

Photomultiplier tubes are well known light detectors and are widely used in various spectroscopic instruments. However, in recent years, some international instrument manufacturers have gradually replaced the photomultipliers used in ICP and photoelectric direct reading spectrometers with semiconductor photodetectors, among which CCDs (Charge-Coupled Devices) are widely used. Detector). Can semiconductor photodetectors replace photomultipliers? Semiconductor photodetector technology development status and trends? How will Hamamatsu Corporation develop semiconductor light detection technology in the future? How does the company see the Chinese instrument industry? How will the future expand the Chinese market? This article will answer everyone one by one.

Hamamatsu Photonics Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “Hamamatsu Corporation” in Japan) is a world-renowned company in photonic technology and photodetectors. Its main products are photomultiplier tubes, photodiodes, image sensors, various light sources, and high-power semiconductors. Lasers and other optical devices. The company's solid business division mainly develops and produces various semiconductor optoelectronic devices and their modular products.

On September 1, 2010, the solid business division of Hamamatsu Corporation of Japan held the "2010 HAMAMATSU Optical Semiconductor Technology Exchange Conference." Mr. Yamamoto Akira, Director of Japan's Hamamatsu Co., Ltd., director of the Division of Solids Business, visited the site. With this as an opportunity, the editor of the Instrument Information Network interviewed Mr. Akira Yamamoto at the expert exchange meeting on the status quo and trends of semiconductor photodetector technology and the future development direction of Hamamatsu Solids Division.

The development status and trend of semiconductor photodetectors is “Photon is Our Business”. Hamamatsu Corporation started as a photomultiplier tube and mainly uses this product to detect photons that are invisible to the naked eye. The company is dedicated to understanding the interaction of photons and photons with other substances, transforming related technologies into products and industrializing them. After several decades of development, Hamamatsu Japan not only continuously improved the vacuum tube detectors, but also vigorously developed semiconductor photodetectors.

The company's solid business unit has been engaged in the research of semiconductor photodetector related technologies for many years. In recent years, the solid business department has attached great importance to the research and development of image sensors, and has made great progress in the integration and modularization of semiconductor photodetectors. Mr. Akira Yamamoto elaborated the research results of Hamamatsu and his views on the development of semiconductor photodetector technology.

Major Products of the Hamamatsu Solids Division (1) In the area of ​​photodetectors, from vacuum tube technology to semiconductor technology, Yamamoto thinks that from vacuum tube technology to semiconductor technology, the Japanese company Hamamatsu can't go upstream. Although the photomultiplier tube is a high-performance detector, the company has also made some improvements to the vacuum tube detector, such as enhancing its quantum efficiency and miniaturizing it, but it still has some difficult problems to solve, such as the difficulty of operating glass materials. Due to the nature and necessity of high voltage, these problems limit the use of photomultiplier tubes.

However, photomultiplier tubes have the inherent advantage of high photon detection sensitivity. Semiconductor photodetectors cannot be completely replaced, but the market-dominated advantages of the latter will become increasingly apparent. Currently in Hamamatsu, Japan, the sales volume of the solid-state business unit has surpassed the electron tube business unit that produces photomultiplier tubes, and it accounts for half of all Hamamatsu's total sales.

Hamamatsu Japan will continue to focus on vacuum tube technology and semiconductor technology and will concentrate on the development of related modules and systems. In short, all technologies related to photon, Hamamatsu Japan will take a positive attitude.

(2) CCD has become more mature With the advancement of technology, CCDs for spectrophotometers, near-infrared spectroscopy, Raman spectroscopy and other spectroscopic instruments have been developed relatively well, and their performance has been greatly improved.

The back-illuminated CCD image sensor developed by Hamamatsu of Japan can reduce the etaloning effect of the CCD (Note: the Etaloning Effect is present in a very thin CCD chip. The incident light is generated on the front and back surfaces of the chip. The interference caused by the reflection causes the CCD spectral sensitivity curve to be uneven around 900 nm, which can significantly increase the sensitivity, quantum efficiency, response time, and signal-to-noise ratio of the image sensor. Through the splicing technique, Hamamatsu splices many CCDs to increase their area. At present, the largest CCD flat panel image sensor can be up to 2mX2m in size and has a very high quantum efficiency. At the same time, its ability to detect long-wavelength near-infrared waves is greatly improved, and it can be used in astronomy and cosmic detection. At present, most of the world's astronomical telescopes and artificial satellites use the semiconductor light detector products of Hamamatsu of Japan.

All kinds of CCD image sensors (3) CMOS development prospects are optimistic, Japan Hamamatsu Corporation strive to allow it to replace CCD

Mr. Yamamoto said that there are many similarities between CMOS (Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor) image sensors and CCDs in terms of production process because of their integration, production cost, response time, ease of use, and power consumption. The advantages in terms of volume, etc., are particularly rapid, and may even develop faster than CCD image sensors. At present, CMOS and CCD have their own advantages. CMOS can not completely replace CCD, but CCD will be replaced by CMOS in many fields in the future.

Hamamatsu is very optimistic about the development prospects of CMOS. It devotes a lot of energy to CMOS and continues to increase the R&D efforts of this product. It strives to replace CMOS with CMOS. The company has made some improvements to the shortcomings of CMOS, introducing back-illuminated technology and using cesium iodide as a conversion crystal to increase the detector's sensitivity and efficiency. After transformation, the performance of an Active Pixel Sensor (APS) is almost as good as that of a CCD.

Recently, Hamamatsu Japan introduced a variety of new CMOS products with different sizes and functions. For example, the CMOS for dental inspection is small in size and suitable for human mouth, and can be imaged at one time. The CMOS flat panel detector for breast cancer detection has the characteristics of large area, fast detection speed, high resolution, and low dose. Can avoid X-ray damage to the human body.

Various types of CMOS image sensors produced by Hamamatsu Japan (4) MOEMS and MEMS have contributed to the modularization and miniaturization of semiconductor photodetectors. The MOEMS (Micro-Opto-Electro-Mechanical System) is in MEMS (Micro- Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) based on the development of new technologies, the system of micro-optical components, microelectronics and micro-mechanical devices organically integrated together to give full play to the overall performance of the three, can achieve optical components The self-alignment can be used for the manufacture of optical devices and devices.

Hamamatsu Corporation not only manufactures various types of semiconductor detectors, but also produces signal processing circuits, data acquisition cards, and module products related to various types of detectors. The solid-state business unit took full advantage of MOEMS and MEMS technology to produce photodiode circuits and modules, silicon avalanche diode modules, image sensor modules and other modular products based on photodiodes, avalanche diodes, and image sensors. Taking a CMOS image sensor as an example, the MOEMS technology can be used to process image sensors, gratings, and subsequent circuits on the same silicon wafer. This realizes the integration and miniaturization of components, and is also convenient for users.

Ultra-small spectrometers recently developed by the thumb-sized ultra-small spectrometer use MEMS nanotechnology (NanoTechnology) technology, which is only thumb-sized and has a sensitive wavelength range of 340-750 nm. From the product to the product module and system, this will be the direction that the Hamamatsu Solids Division of Japan has to adhere to.

With the development of the times, people's demand for small, portable things will increase. In Japan, some small instruments that test cosmetic whitening effects are popular, and similar small instruments are also popular in the United States. Analytical instruments and medical instruments have to go into the homes of ordinary people, they are inevitably required to be miniaturized, and the miniaturization of instruments will inevitably require miniaturization of their devices. Semiconductor technology is an effective means to meet this demand, and its current development of an important theme is MEMS, and NanoTechnology (nanotechnology) should be the key.

From vacuum tube technology to semiconductor technology, MEMS, and nanotechnology, this is the evolution of Hamamatsu technology. In the next few years, Japan's Hamamatsu still needs to thoroughly study these technologies. This is a constant policy. The only thing to change is the speed of development of various technologies. The earlier the technology is developed, the more competitive the technology of Hamamatsu Japan is, which is very important.

High-level member of the Hamamatsu Conference (Mr. Hamamatsu Photonics Co., Ltd., director of the Solid State Division, Mr. Yamamoto Akira (second from the right), Beijing Hamamatsu Photonics Technology Co., Ltd. Mr. Xie Lin (second from left), Beijing Bin Mr. Duan Hongbin (first from the left), Assistant to General Manager and Chief of the First Division of Songguangzi Co., Ltd., and Mr. Ito Shiji (first from the right), Solid Division, Hamamatsu Photonics Co., Ltd., Japan

Hamamatsu will increase the promotion of semiconductor photodetectors in the Chinese market. Mr. Yamamoto expressed his views on the development of the Chinese scientific instrument industry: The Chinese scientific instrument industry is booming, although the current semiconductor light detection in Hamamatsu, Japan There are not many users of the device in China, but the company pays more attention to the Chinese market and will promote the latest products and technologies to China.

(1) China's scientific instrument industry is bound to rise, and its market capacity is huge. Looking back at the past, mobile phones and computers are rapidly developing in China. The next step is that China's instrumentation industry will also develop rapidly. Medical instruments and analytical instruments are closely related to people's health. China’s population is ten times that of Japan, which means that if the Chinese instrument industry develops, its market capacity may be 10 times that of Japan. The development of instrument detectors is closely related to the development of scientific instruments.

Satisfying the needs of users has always been the direction of Hamamatsu Corporation in Japan. As a supplier of instrument components, Hamamatsu Japan must take a step ahead of the market in order to provide products that the market needs. Although China's scientific instrument industry may take another decade or two to develop, Hamamatsu is very patient and will pay close attention to what kind of technology and products the Chinese market needs, and will continue to develop new products to meet These needs.

(2) Increasing the promotion of semiconductor light detectors in China's analytical instrument industry Mr. Akira Yamamoto introduced some cases of Hamamatsu users in Japan. About 50% of various semiconductor detectors produced by Hamamatsu Solids are sold abroad, and the rest are sold in Japan. Many internationally renowned instrument manufacturers use Hamamatsu detectors. However, in China, although instrument companies also use Hamamatsu's semiconductor detectors, the number is small.

About 50% of Hamamatsu's solids business units are used in medical devices, and this area is still a very important area. At the same time, because there are many similarities between medical instruments and analytical instruments, Hamamatsu Japan intends to develop its advantages in the field of medical instruments to analytical instruments and other fields.

At the same time, the company will strengthen communication and exchanges with Chinese users, increase marketing efforts, introduce new technologies and new products for semiconductor optoelectronic devices from solid-state divisions to Chinese users, and also tell them how to select, use and apply them. Hamamatsu's products hope to contribute to the development of the Chinese instrument industry.

Postscript In the interview process, the author listened carefully to Mr. Yamamoto's views on the development of instrument companies. He mentioned: “If small-scale scientific instrument companies do not have characteristics, there will be no development potential and market competitiveness. Shimadzu, Beckman, etc. Well-known international companies are developed by small and distinctive enterprises, small enterprises are not scary, terrible is that small businesses do not have their own characteristics, go with the flow, only know that imitate repetition, do not know how to create, and ultimately lead to price competition, killing each other Although the Hamamatsu Corporation of Japan is a small company, it has been working hard to develop various technologies and products related to photonics and hopes to promote the development of the scientific instrument industry through the company's products."

Perhaps, Hamamatsu Corporation of Japan is able to grow and expand because it has been sticking to its own characteristics for more than 50 years, focusing on its own advantages in the field of photodetectors, and thus can occupy other companies in the optoelectronic components market. Place. In contrast, at present, the overall domestic scientific instrument companies "are not big enough, not small enough," and the development of instrument and component companies is even more sluggish. These objective factors determine that the Chinese instrument industry will not have a big change in a short time. At the same time, the Chinese instrument manufacturers not only stare at the R&D of the entire instrument, but also cannot ignore the development of instrument components.