SOLID-STATE IMAGING ELEMENT, SOLID-STATE IMAGING DEVICE, CAMERA, AND DRIVE METHOD

摘要

A semiconductor device is a solid-state imaging element formed on a semiconductor substrate and having an overflow drain structure which discharges an excessive charge generated in a plurality of photoelectric elements (1). The solid-state imaging element reads out a signal charge accumulated in the photoelectric conversion element (1) and reads it out via a gate electrode (18) to a vertical transfer unit (2a). The solid-state imaging element includes: a first voltage generation circuit which applies to the semiconductor substrate, a substrate voltage which defines the overflow barrier height in the overflow drain structure; and a second voltage generation circuit which selectively generates a first voltage and a second voltage indicating the wave height of a pulse superposed on the substrate voltage at a generation timing of a read-out pulse applied to the read-out gate electrode (18).