A 9.8 μm sample and hold time to amplitude converter CMOS SPAD pixel

Author

Parmesan, Luca ; Dutton, Neale A. W. ; Calder, Neil J. ; Holmes, Andrew J. ; Grant, Lindsay A. ; Henderson, Robert K.

Author_Institution

Imaging Div., STMicroelectron., Edinburgh, UK

fYear

2014

fDate

22-26 Sept. 2014

Firstpage

290

Lastpage

293

Abstract

A 9.8μm pitch SPAD-based pixel is presented with a novel and scalable Sample and Hold (S/H) Time to Amplitude Converter (TAC) pixel architecture offering the potential to create high spatial resolution Time Correlated Single Photon Counting (TCSPC) image sensors in the future. This pixel pitch is an order of magnitude smaller than previous TCSPC pixels. The NMOS-only TAC performance is measured in a single point TCSPC optical experimental setup. 93ps LSB time resolution is obtained over 80ns dynamic range. Dynamic range limitations are discussed and improvements are suggested.

Keywords

CMOS image sensors; avalanche photodiodes; photon counting; sample and hold circuits; time-digital conversion; CMOS SPAD pixel; NMOS only TAC; high spatial resolution image sensor; pitch SPAD based pixel; sample and hold circuit; size 9.8 mum; time correlated single photon counting image sensor; time-amplitude converter; CMOS integrated circuits; Dynamic range; Image sensors; Lasers; Photonics; Transistors; SPAD; Single Photon Avalanche Diode; TAC; TCSPC; Time Correlated Single Photon Counting; Time to Amplitude Converter;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Solid State Device Research Conference (ESSDERC), 2014 44th European

Conference_Location

Venice

ISSN

1930-8876

Print_ISBN

978-1-4799-4378-4

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/ESSDERC.2014.6948817

Filename

6948817