High speed optoelectronic mixer

Claim 1

An optoelectronic mixer comprising: (a) a substrate with planar conducting electrodes on a surface thereof; (b) one of said planar conducting electrode structures having a non-conducting space providing a non-conductive gap on said surface and adapted to be illuminated by photons from a photon source which generates a photon beam controlled by a first source of oscillatory electrical signals whereby a photo-generated plasma forms a conducting path across the gap in accordance with such oscillatory signals thereby periodically completing an electrical circuit between: (i) a second source of oscillatory electrical signals adapted to be coupled to one side of said electrode and (ii) a utilization device adapted to be coupled to another of said conducting electrodes; (c) the product of said first and second oscillatory signals being thereby coupled to said load; (d) and wherein the photon source is a laser which is biased so that the intensity of the photon beam produced by the laser varies in a linear fashion throughout its operating range such that the mixer is operated in the bilinear mode such that the first and second signals are mixed in a linear fashion.