A CMOS focal-plane motion sensor with BJT-based retinal smoothing network and modified correlation-based algorithm

This work presents and implements a CMOS real-time focal-plane motion sensor intended to detect the global motion, using the bipolar junction transistor (BJT)-based retinal smoothing network and the modified correlation-based algorithm. In the proposed design, the BJT-based retinal photoreceptor and smoothing network are adopted to acquire images and enhance the contrast of an image while the modified correlation-based algorithm is used in signal processing to determine the velocity and direction of the incident image. The deviations of the calculated velocity and direction for different image patterns are greatly reduced by averaging the correlated output over 16 frame-sampling periods. The proposed motion sensor includes a 32×32 pixel array with a pixel size of 100×100 μm². The fill factor is 11.6% and the total chip area is 4200×4000 μm². The DC power consumption is 120 mW at 5 V in the dark. Experimental results have successfully confirmed that the proposed motion sensor can work with different incident images and detect a velocity between 1 pixel/s and 140,000 pixels/s via controlling the frame-sampling period. The minimum detectable displacement in a frame-sampling period is 5 μm. Consequently, the proposed high-performance new motion sensor can be applied to many real-time motion detection systems.