A $64\times 64$-Pixel Flash LiDAR SPAD Imager with Distributed Pixel-to-Pixel Correlation for Background Rejection, Tunable Automatic Pixel Sensitivity and First-Last Event Detection Strategies for Space Applications

Manuzzato, Enrico; Tontini, Alessandro; Seljak, A.; Perenzoni, Matteo

doi:10.1109/isscc42614.2022.9731622

Cited by 11 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…There have been a number of different timing circuit architectures proposed in the literature. As an example, [22] presents a distributed digital silicon photomultiplier with a flexible detection strategy and auto-sensitivity with pixel-level TDCs, while [23] presents a per-SPAD TDC that records spatial cross correlation functions of entangled photon fluxes. In their direct TOF receiver, [24] divided the SPAD array into a number of predefined blocks, and allocated TDC resources to only one of the blocks implemented separately on-chip for each measurement.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Single Chip SPAD Based Vision Sensing System With Integrated Memristive Spiking Neuromorphic Processing

et al. 2023

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This paper presents a new scalable 8 × 8 single photon avalanche diode (SPAD) based vision sensor with integrated spiking neuromorphic system on a single chip. The proposed vision sensing system adopts the benefits of SPAD's high quantum efficiency and energy efficiency of memristive spiking neuromorphic processing. The SPAD based vision sensor includes biologically inspired address event representation (AER) readout to generate asynchronous digital address events at the output reducing computation and making it suitable to process directly with integrated on-chip spiking neuromorphic system in a faster and more energy efficient way. A novel on-chip interface is designed to convert the output events of a SPAD-based event sensor into temporally coded spikes (TCS) that enable on-chip processing with integrated spiking neuromorphic system. We have tested the prototype vision sensing system for imaging characters by SPAD based vision sensor and recognizing them using the integrated memristive spiking neuromorphic system. To help with the evaluation, we have built a complete temporal pulses data set from simulating the SPAD vision sensor with AER readout in imaging characters and applied directly to integrated spiking neuromorphic system via designed novel on-chip interface. The achieved accuracy is 89.54% with a power consumption of 316 𝜇W for the memristive neuromorphic processor. The SPAD based vision sensor exhibits array-level dynamic range of 148 dB with a power consumption of 2.8 mW. The designed SPAD-based vision sensing system with an integrated spiking neuromorphic system on a single chip shows great promise for robotics, autonomous vehicles, health, and security applications.

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Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Single Chip SPAD Based Vision Sensing System With Integrated Memristive Spiking Neuromorphic Processing

et al. 2023

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“…With a different method, based on a smart accumulation technique by Yoshioka et al [14], the signal to noise ratio (SNR) is increased by merging the information from pixels observing similar regions of the scene. A different approach has been recently proposed by Manuzzato et al [15], where a per-pixel circuit is able to automatically decrease the SPAD sensitivity reducing the probability of saturation in case of high background intensities, favoring the detection of laser photons. Yet another technique is known as timegating, where by means of a search procedure several subranges of the scene are measured, increasing the SNR at the expense of an increased acquisition time [16].…”

Section: Introduction and Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…One strategy to reduce the bandwidth requirement on the amount of data which is transferred from the chip to the controller (usually an FPGA or µC) is to integrate the histogram, or part of it, directly on chip. Several solutions are proposed in the literature to integrate histogramming capability onchip [24], [30]- [38], but despite the advantage in bandwidth performance compared to other solutions where the histogram is built off-chip [12], [13], [15]- [17], still many limitations are present. In general, the on-chip realization of either a partial or full histogram requires additional area, which can be obtained by either reducing the fill factor or by using expensive 3Dstacked solutions.…”

Section: Introduction and Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Histogram-Less LiDAR Through SPAD Response Linearization

Tontini,

Mazzucchi,

Passerone

et al. 2024

IEEE Sensors J.

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We present a new method to acquire the 3D information from a SPAD-based direct-Time-of-Flight (d-ToF) imaging system which does not require the construction of a histogram of timestamps and can withstand high flux operation regime. The proposed acquisition scheme emulates the behavior of a SPAD detector with no distortion due to dead time, and extracts the ToF information by a simple average operation on the photon timestamps ensuring ease of integration in a dedicated sensor and scalability to large arrays. The method is validated through a comprehensive mathematical analysis, whose predictions are in agreement with a numerical Monte Carlo model of the problem. Finally, we show the validity of the predictions in a real d-ToF measurement setup under challenging background conditions well beyond the typical pile-up limit of 5% detection rate up to a distance of 3.8 m.

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“…Single-photon avalanche diode (SPAD) pixels have been developed for time-of-flight (ToF) range image sensors [1][2][3][4][5]. In addition, photon-counting imaging has been proposed as a promising technology for image acquisition with noiseless readout and high dynamic range (HDR) [6][7][8][9].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A 3.06 μm Single-Photon Avalanche Diode Pixel with Embedded Metal Contact and Power Grid on Deep Trench Pixel Isolation for High-Resolution Photon Counting

Ogi,

Sano,

Nakata

et al. 2023

Sensors

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In this study, a 3.06 μm pitch single-photon avalanche diode (SPAD) pixel with an embedded metal contact and power grid on two-step deep trench isolation in the pixel is presented. The embedded metal contact can suppress edge breakdown and reduce the dark count rate to 15.8 cps with the optimized potential design. The embedded metal for the contact is also used as an optical shield and a low crosstalk probability of 0.4% is achieved, while the photon detection efficiency is as high as 57%. In addition, the integration of a power grid and the polysilicon resistor on SPAD pixels can help to reduce the voltage drop in anode power supply and reduce the power consumption with SPAD multiplication, respectively, in a large SPAD pixel array for a high-resolution photon-counting image sensor.

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A $64\times 64$-Pixel Flash LiDAR SPAD Imager with Distributed Pixel-to-Pixel Correlation for Background Rejection, Tunable Automatic Pixel Sensitivity and First-Last Event Detection Strategies for Space Applications

Cited by 11 publications

References 2 publications

A Single Chip SPAD Based Vision Sensing System With Integrated Memristive Spiking Neuromorphic Processing

A Single Chip SPAD Based Vision Sensing System With Integrated Memristive Spiking Neuromorphic Processing

Histogram-Less LiDAR Through SPAD Response Linearization

A 3.06 μm Single-Photon Avalanche Diode Pixel with Embedded Metal Contact and Power Grid on Deep Trench Pixel Isolation for High-Resolution Photon Counting

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