| 摘要 |
The present invention is directed to an apparatus, method and software product for enhancing the dynamic range of a CCD sensor without substantially increasing the noise. Initially, the area of a N×M pixel CCD sensor array is subdivided into two regions, a large region having (M−a) pixels in each column for outputting large-amplitude signals with low noise and a smaller region having a pixels in each column for outputting small-amplitude signals with improved dynamic range. At integration time, the CCD is read out one region's rows at a time into the horizontal shift registers by shifting the pixel charges in either a or M−a vertical shifts. The charges in the horizontal shift registers are then shifted out of the horizontal shift registers in N horizontal shifts. Next, the remaining pixels in the region of the CCD are read out into the horizontal shift registers by shifting the pixel charges in the other of a or M−a vertical shifts. Those charges are then shifted out of the horizontal shift registers in N horizontal shifts. In a spectrographic application, the data from the two regions is read out in the form of a large-amplitude channel from the larger region's rows and a small-amplitude channel from the smaller region's rows. |
| 主权项 |
1. A method for enhancing dynamic range of data read from an imaging sensor, the imaging sensor comprising N linear pixel arrays, each of the N linear pixel arrays having M charge coupled pixels, each pixel charge coupled, and further being coupled to one of N registers, the method comprising:
integrating charge in at least some pixels of the N linear pixel arrays; combining charge from a first region of the N linear pixel arrays of the imaging sensor in the N registers by shifting charge from the first region along each of the N linear pixel arrays to each of the N registers, the first region of the N linear pixel arrays having at least one pixel line and the at least one pixel line of the first region is oriented in an orthogonal direction to the N linear pixel arrays; shifting charge from the N registers along a linear path; representing charge from at least a portion of the first region of the N linear pixel arrays, shifted out of the N registers, as a corresponding portion of N first region data signals; combining charge from a second region of the N linear pixel arrays in the N registers by shifting charge from the second region along each of the N linear pixel arrays to each of the N registers, the first and second regions having at least three pixel lines, and the at least three pixel lines being oriented in an orthogonal direction to the N linear pixel arrays; shifting charge from the N registers along a linear path; representing charge from at least a portion of the second region of the N linear pixel arrays, shifted out of the N registers, as a corresponding portion of N second region data signals; and defining the first region of the N linear pixel arrays of the imaging sensor by designating at least one pixel line as belonging to the first region of the N linear pixel arrays, wherein defining the first region of the N linear pixel arrays of the imaging sensor by designating at least one pixel line as belonging to the first region of the N linear pixel arrays further comprises:
assessing a level of improvement in dynamic range in at least one signal taken from the corresponding portion of N first region data signals, and the corresponding portion of N second region data signals; anddetermining an amount of pixel lines belonging to the first region of the N linear pixel arrays for improving the dynamic range in the at least one signal, wherein the amount of pixel lines relates to the level of improvement in dynamic range. |
