A high performance, low-noise 128-channel readout integrated circuit for instrumentation and X-ray applications

Indigo Operations, subdivision of FLIR Systems, has designed, fabricated, and tested a mixed-signal readout integrated circuit (ROIC), the ISC9717, for instrumentation and flat panel X-ray applications. This off-the-shelf, high performance, low-noise, 128-channel device is fully programmable with a multistage pipelined architecture and a 9 to 14-bit programmable A/D converter per channel, making it suitable for numerous instrumentation detector types, especially for X-ray imaging applications. Each 80-micron pitch amplification channel includes a low noise integrator, a low pass filter with programmable time constant, a correlated double sampling to remove kTC and 1/f noise, and a programmable A/D converter (9 to 14-bit). Both integrator and correlated double sampling have programmable gains to cover a wide range of input signal dynamic range. The ISC9717 integrates both charge polarities, making it suitable for silicon (Si), amorphous silicon, gallium arsenide (GaAs), cadmium zinc telluride (CdZnTe) detector materials and selenium (Se) or cesium iodide (CsI) flat panel arrays. The ROIC is designed to interface along one or two sides of the detector or flat panels like TFT, where ROICs are abutted, each reading out charge from pixels multiplexed on to 128 read lines.