Increasing the dynamic range of CMOS photodiode imagers

Details Increasing the dynamic range of CMOS photodiode imagers Increasing the dynamic range of CMOS photodiode imagers

2007-06-26

2007-06-26

Le, Que T. (Department: 2878)

Radiant energy

Photocells; circuits and apparatus

Photocell controlled circuit

C250S2140RC

Reexamination Certificate

active

11191603

ABSTRACT:
A multiple-step reset process and circuit for resetting a voltage stored on a photodiode of an imaging device. A first stage of the reset occurs while a source and a drain of a pixel source-follower transistor are held at ground potential and the photodiode and a gate of the pixel source-follower transistor are charged to an initial reset voltage having potential less that of a supply voltage. A second stage of the reset occurs after the initial reset voltage is stored on the photodiode and the gate of the pixel source-follower transistor and the source and drain voltages of the pixel source-follower transistor are released from ground potential thereby allowing the source and drain voltages of the pixel source-follower transistor to assume ordinary values above ground potential and resulting in a capacitive feed-through effect that increases the voltage on the photodiode to a value greater than the initial reset voltage.

REFERENCES:
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Written Opinion of The International Searching Authority for the Corresponding PCT Application No. PCT/US2005/026772, issued Nov. 24, 2005 (6 pages).
Fowler, B., et al., “Low Noise Readout using Active Reset for CMOS APS,”Sensors and camera systems for scientific, industrial and digital photography applications; Proceedings of the Conference, pp. 126-135 (Jan. 24-26, 2000).

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