Title :
Parallel and pipelined front-end for multi-element silicon detectors in scanning electron microscopy
Author :
Boulin, C. ; Epstein, A.
Author_Institution :
EMBL, Heidelberg, Germany
fDate :
4/1/1992 12:00:00 AM
Abstract :
A silicon quadrant detector (128 elements) was implemented as an electron detector in a scanning transmission electron microscope. As the electron beam scans over the sample, electrons are counted during each pixel. An ASIC was developed for the multichannel counting system. The digital front-end carries out the readout of all elements, in four groups, and uses these data to computer linear combinations to generate up to eight simultaneous images. For the preprocessing a parallel and pipelined system was implemented. Dedicated software tools were developed to generate the programs for all the processors. These tools are transparently accessed by the user via a user-friendly interface
Keywords :
electron detection and measurement; parallel processing; physics computing; pipeline processing; scanning-transmission electron microscopy; semiconductor counters; software tools; ASIC; Si; digital front-end; electron detector; linear combinations; multi-element; multichannel counting system; parallel; pipelined front-end; pixel; preprocessing; quadrant detector; readout; scanning electron microscopy; scanning transmission electron microscope; simultaneous images; software tools; user-friendly interface; Application specific integrated circuits; Bonding; Ceramics; Detectors; Electron beams; Instruments; Optical microscopy; Scanning electron microscopy; Silicon; Transmission electron microscopy;
Journal_Title :
Nuclear Science, IEEE Transactions on