Digital photon-counting geiger-mode avalanche photodiode solid-state monolithic intensity imaging focal-plane with scalable readout circuitry

摘要

A photon-counting Geiger-mode avalanche photodiode intensity imaging array includes an array of pixels, each having an avalanche photodiode. A pixel senses an avalanche event and stores, in response to the sensed avalanche event, a single bit digital value therein. An array of accumulators are provided such that each accumulator is associated with a pixel. A row decoder circuit addresses a pixel row within the array of pixels. A bit sensing circuit converts a precharged capacitance into a digital value during read operations.