A photon-counting avalanche photodiode array with fully integrated actigve quenching and recharging circuit

摘要

The design of a 4 x 1 photon-counting avalanche photodiode array with fully integrated active bias controlling circuit is presented in this paper. The array uses highly sensitive Geiger mode avalanche photodiodes and is capable of detecting four single-photon-level optical signals simultaneously. The photodiode pixels can work either in parallel mode or independently because of the separate gate configuration. The photodiodes are fabricated using a CMOS compatible process with the integrated active quenching and recharging circuit manufactured via 1.5μm CMOS process. The whole system is included on a 2.5mm x 2.5mm die. Simulations show that the fully functional system can detect single photons at up to 20MHz with each pixel or 80MHz with all channels.