Abstract

Abstract: Hybrid pixel detectors were developed to equip the inner layers of the enormous detectors at CERN ’s Large Hadron Collider. The basic building block of these detectors is a monolithic matrix of fully depleted semiconductor diodes connected by high density bump bonding to equally segmented readout chips. In each ASIC readout channel every particle which deposits enough charge in the detector element is detected and assigned to a particular bunch crossing of the LHC beam. The extremely high threshold to noise ratios which are obtained in such systems produce almost noise-free particle images even at very high frame rates. The same detection mechanism can be applied to X-rays and, as each X-ray photon is detected individually, its energy can be measured and spectroscopic or ‘colour’ X-ray images produced. This presentation will cover the basic concepts of ASIC design for such detectors and recount how the transition from High Energy Physics to X-ray imaging was made. Access to very deep sub-micron CMOS has allowed the implementation of sophisticated on-pixel front-end architectures designed to overcome some of the inherent limitations in the detection process.

Everyone is welcome.

Tea, coffee and biscuits will be available from 3:45pm