TY - JOUR
T1 - Optimum design of conversion gain and full well capacity in CMOS image sensor with lateral overflow integration capacitor
AU - Akahane, Nana
AU - Adachi, Satoru
AU - Mizobuchi, Koichi
AU - Sugawa, Shigetoshi
N1 - Funding Information:
Manuscript received January 6, 2009; revised June 1, 2009. First published September 25, 2009; current version published October 21, 2009. The work of N. Akahane was supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Research Fellowship Program under Grant 185298. The review of this paper was arranged by Editor E. Fossum.
PY - 2009
Y1 - 2009
N2 - An optimum design theory to clarify a possible limit of achieving both high conversion gain (CG) and full well capacity (FWC) at the same time in a CMOS image sensor with a lateral overflow integration capacitor (LOFIC) in a pixel is discussed. The possible limit of both high CG and high FWC is theoretically derived from a signal-to-noise-ratio (SNR) formula at a switching point from a low light signal (S1) to a bright one (S2). Based on this theory, a 1/4-in VGA-format 5.6-μ-pixel-pitch CMOS image sensor has been fabricated through a 0.18-μm 2P3M CMOS technology. A high-quality wide-dynamic-range image sensing has been demonstrated with no significant visible noise, achieving over 32 dB of SNR for an 18% gray card.
AB - An optimum design theory to clarify a possible limit of achieving both high conversion gain (CG) and full well capacity (FWC) at the same time in a CMOS image sensor with a lateral overflow integration capacitor (LOFIC) in a pixel is discussed. The possible limit of both high CG and high FWC is theoretically derived from a signal-to-noise-ratio (SNR) formula at a switching point from a low light signal (S1) to a bright one (S2). Based on this theory, a 1/4-in VGA-format 5.6-μ-pixel-pitch CMOS image sensor has been fabricated through a 0.18-μm 2P3M CMOS technology. A high-quality wide-dynamic-range image sensing has been demonstrated with no significant visible noise, achieving over 32 dB of SNR for an 18% gray card.
KW - CMOS image sensor
KW - Conversion gain (CG)
KW - Full well capacity (FWC)
KW - Signal-to-noise ratio (SNR)
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U2 - 10.1109/TED.2009.2030550
DO - 10.1109/TED.2009.2030550
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:70350741214
SN - 0018-9383
VL - 56
SP - 2429
EP - 2435
JO - IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices
JF - IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices
IS - 11
ER -