Photodetector with high dynamic range and increased operating temperature
AssigneeCSEM Centre Suisse d'Electronique et de Microtechnique SA
InventorPeter Seitz
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Abstract
A photodiode (1) in a conventional photodetector-pixel architecture is supplied with a shunt diode (2) connected to a control voltage (VC). Suitable selection of the constant or time-varying control voltage (VC) allows a combination of linear and non-linear, preferably logarithmic illumination response of the photodiode (1), resulting in a high dynamic photodetecting range of more than five orders of magnitude. The properties of the shunt diode (2) and the control voltage (VC) can be chosen such that the resulting dark current matches the dark current of the photodiode (1), which becomes independent of voltage for high temperatures. This enables photodetecting with a sufficient dynamic range at higher temperatures than possible with conventional photodetectors.
Claims13
A photodetector comprising
- a photodetecting element for generating electric charge carriers as a function of incident electromagnetic radiation, coupled between a ground line and a sense node;
- and
- a diode element coupled between the sense node and a control line.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.