CCDs : Current Developments

Part 1 : Deep Depletion CCDs

Improving the red response of CCDs.

Part 2 : Low Light Level CCDs (LLLCCD)

A new idea from Marconi (EEV) to reduce or eliminate CCD read-out noise.
Part 1 : Deep Depletion CCDs

Improving the red response of CCDs.

 Charge Collection in a CCD.

Photons entering the CCD create electron-hole pairs. The electrons are then attracted towards
the most positive potential in the device where they create ‘charge packets’. Each packet
corresponds to one pixel

boundary

boundary
incoming
photons

pixel

pixel
n-type silicon Electrode Structure
Charge packet
p-type silicon SiO2 Insulating layer
 Deep Depletion CCDs 1.

The electric field structure in a CCD defines to a large degree its Quantum Efficiency (QE). Consider
first a thick frontside illuminated CCD, which has a poor QE.
Electric potential

Cross section through a thick frontside illuminated CCD

In this region the electric potential gradient

is fairly low i.e. the electric field is low.

Potential along this line

shown in graph above.

Any photo-electrons created in the region of low electric field stand a much higher chance of
recombination and loss. There is only a weak external field to sweep apart the photo-electron
and the hole it leaves behind.
 Deep Depletion CCDs 2.

In a thinned CCD , the field free region is simply etched away.

Electric potential

Cross section through a thinned CCD

There is now a high electric field throughout the

full depth of the CCD.

Problem : Thinned CCDs may have good blue

This volume is response but they become transparent
etched away at longer wavelengths; the red response
during manufacture
suffers.

Red photons can now pass

right through the CCD.

Photo-electrons created anywhere throughout the depth of the device will now be detected.
Photons no longer have to pass through the electrode structure to reach active silicon.
 Deep Depletion CCDs 3.
Ideally we require all the benefits of a thinned CCD plus an improved red response. The solution is to use a
CCD with an intermediate thickness of about 40µm constructed from Hi-Resistivity silicon. The increased
thickness makes the device opaque to red photons. The use of Hi-Resistivity silicon means that there are no field
free regions despite the greater thickness.
Electric potential

Cross section through a Deep Depletion CCD

Problem :
Hi resistivity silicon contains much lower
impurity levels than normal. Very few wafer
fabrication factories commonly use this
material and deep depletion CCDs have to
be designed and made to order.

Red photons are now absorbed in

the thicker bulk of the device.

There is now a high electric field throughout the full depth of the CCD. CCDs manufactured in this way
are known as Deep depletion CCDs. The name implies that the region of high electric field, also known as
the ‘depletion zone’ extends deeply into the device.
 QE Improvements with Deep Depletion CCDs
100

90

80

70
CC1D20 MBE single
60 AR @320nm
QE %

CC1D20 BIV Broad

50 Band AR

40 EEV12 (Standard
Thinned)
30
Marconi Deep
20 Depletion (broad
Band AR)
10

0
300 400 500 600 700 800 900 1000
nm
 Deep Depletion CCDs 4.

Fringing will also be reduced

Images illuminated by 900nm filter with 2nm bandpass

Thinned Marconi CCD (Current ISIS Blue) CCID20 Deep Depletion CCD

Test data courtesy of ESO

 ING Deep Depletion Camera

Destined for ISIS RED sometime this Summer

Part 2 : Low Light Level CCDs (LLLCCDs)

A new idea from Marconi that creates internal electron gain

in a CCD and reduces read-noise to sub-electron levels.
 CCD Analogy
VERTICAL
RAIN (PHOTONS) CONVEYOR
BELTS
(CCD COLUMNS)

BUCKETS (PIXELS)

MEASURING
CYLINDER
HORIZONTAL (OUTPUT
CONVEYOR BELT AMPLIFIER)
(SERIAL REGISTER)
 Photomicrograph of a corner of an EEV CCD.

Image Area

Serial Register

Bus wires
Edge of
Silicon
Read Out Amplifier
 Charge Collection in a CCD.

Photons entering the CCD create electron-hole pairs. The electrons are then attracted towards
the most positive potential in the device where they create ‘charge packets’. Each packet
corresponds to one pixel.

boundary

boundary
incoming
photons

pixel

pixel
n-type silicon Electrode Structure
Charge packet
p-type silicon SiO2 Insulating layer
 Conventional Clocking 1

Insulating layer
Surface electrodes
Charge packet (photo-electrons)
N-type silicon
P-type silicon
Potential Energy

Charge packets occupy potential minimums

Potential Energy Conventional Clocking 2
Potential Energy Conventional Clocking 3
Potential Energy Conventional Clocking 4
Potential Energy Conventional Clocking 5
Potential Energy Conventional Clocking 6
Potential Energy Conventional Clocking 7
Potential Energy Conventional Clocking 8
Potential Energy Conventional Clocking 9
 Conventional Clocking 10

Charge packets have moved one pixel to the right

Potential Energy
 LLLCCD Gain Register Architecture

Conventional CCD LLLCCD

Image Area Image Area

(Architecture unchanged)

On-Chip On-Chip
Amplifier Amplifier

{
Serial register Serial register
Gain register

The Gain Register can be added to any existing design

 Multiplication Clocking 1

In this diagram we see a small section of the gain register

Gain electrode
Potential Energy
 Multiplication Clocking 2
Gain electrode energised. Charge packets accelerated strongly into deep potential well.
Energetic electrons loose energy through creation of more charge carriers (analogous to
multiplication effects in the dynodes of a photo-multiplier) .

Gain electrode
Potential Energy
 Multiplication Clocking 3

Clocking continues but each time the charge packets pass through the gain electrode, further
amplification is produced. Gain per stage is low, <1.015, however the number of stages is high so the
total gain can easily exceed 10,000
Potential Energy
 Multiplication Clocking 4
Gain Sensitivity of CCD65

10000
1000

Gain
100
10
1
20 25 30 35 40
Clock High Voltage

Readout Noise of CCD65

100
Equivalent noise
electrons RMS

10

0.1

0.01
20 25 30 35 40
Clock High Voltage

The Multiplication Register has a gain strongly dependant on the clock voltage
 Noise Equations 1.

Conventional CCD SNR Equation

SNR = Q.I.t.[Q.t.( I +B ) +N ] 2 -0.5
SKY r

Q = Quantum Efficiency
I = Photons per pixel per second
t = Integration time in seconds
BSKY = Sky background in photons per pixel per second
Nr = Amplifier (read-out) noise in electrons RMS

Very hard to get Nr < 3e, and then only by slowing down the readout
significantly. At TV frame rates, noise > 50e

Trade-off between readout speed and readout noise

 Noise Equations 2.

LLLCCD SNR Equation

SNR = Q.I.t.Fn.[Q.t.Fn.( I +BSKY) +(Nr/G)2 ] -0.5

G = Gain of the Gain Register

Fn = Multiplication Noise factor = 0.5

With G set sufficiently high,

this term goes to zero, even at
TV frame rates.

Unfortunately, the problem of multiplication noise is introduced

Readout speed and readout noise are decoupled

 Multiplication Noise 1.
In this example, A flat field image is read out through the multiplication register.
Mean illumination is 16e/pixel. Multiplication register gain =100

Ideal Histogram, StdDev=Gain x (Mean Illumination in electrons )0.5

Actual Histogram, StdDev=Gain x (Mean Illumination in electrons )0.5 x M

Histogram broadened
by multiplication noise
Probability

M=1.4

Electrons per pixel at output of multiplication register

 Multiplication Noise 2.
Multiplication noise has the same effect as a reduction of QE by a factor of two.
In high signal environments , LLLCCDs will generally perform worse than
conventional CCDs. They come into their own, however, in low signal, high-speed
regimes.
SNR

Conventional CCD

LLLCCD

Signal Level
 Photon Counting 1.
Offers a way of removing multiplication noise.

Photo-electron
detection threshold
CCD Video waveform

One No One No No Two

photo-electron photo-electron photo-electron photo-electron photo-electron photo-electrons

Co-incidence loss
Photo-electron detection pulses here
Fast comparator

CCD

Approx 100ns

SNR = Q.I.t.[Q.t.( I +BSKY)] -0.5

Noiseless Detector
 Photon Counting 2.

If exposure levels are too high, multi-electron events will be counted as single-electron
events, leading to co-incidence losses . This limits the linearity and reduces the effective
QE of the system.
Non-Linearity from Photon-Counting Coincidence Losses

Photo-electron
generation rate Non-Linearity
(electrons per pixel per frame) %
0.02 1
0.033 1.6
0.1 5

In the case of a hypothetical 1K x 1K photon counting CCD, the maximum frame rate
would be approximately 10Hz. If we can only accept 5% non-linearity then the maximum
illumination would be approximately 1 photo-electron per pixel per second.
 Summary.
The three operational regimes of LLLCCDs
1) Unity Gain Mode.
The CCD operates normally with the SNR dictated by the photon shot noise added in
quadrature with the amplifier read noise. In general a slow readout is required (300KPix/second)
to obtain low read noise (4 electrons would be typical). Higher readout speeds possible but there
will be a trade-off with the read-noise.

2) High Gain Mode.

Gain set sufficiently high to make noise in the readout amplifier of the CCD negligible.
The drawback is the introduction of Multiplication Noise that reduces the SNR
by a factor of 1.4. Read noise is de-coupled from read-out speed. Very high speed readout
possible, up to 11MPixels per second, although in practice the frame rate will probably be
limited by factors external to the CCD.

3) Photon Counting Mode.

Gain is again set high but the video waveform is passed through a comparator. Each trigger
of the comparator is then treated as a single photo-electron of equal weight. Multiplication
noise is thus eliminated. Risk of coincidence losses at higher illumination levels.
Possible Application 1.
Acquisition Cameras

Performance at CASS of WHT analysed below. The calculated SNR is for a single TV frame (40ms).
It is assumed that the seeing disc of the target star evenly illuminates 28 pixels
(0.6” seeing, 0.1”/pixel plate scale). SNR calculated for each pixel of the image.

3.5
Normal CCD
3
L3CS (LLLCCD)
2.5
theoretical limit
2
SNR

Zero-noise image tube

1.5

0.5

0
17 18 19 20 21 22
Mv

Assumptions: CCD QE=85%, LLLCCD QE=30%, Image Tube QE =11%

dark of moon, seeing 0.6”, 24um pixels (0.1”per pixel), 25Hz frame rate
Possible Application 2.
Acquisition Cameras

As for the previous slide but instead the exposure time is increased to 10s

10

6
SNR

4
Cryocam (standard CCD)
3
L3CS (LLLCCD)
2
theoretical limit
1
Zero-noise image tube
0
17 18 19 20 21 22
Mv
Possible Application 3.
Photon Counting Faint Object Spectroscopy
LLLCCDs operating in photon counting mode would seem to offer some promise.
The graph below shows the time taken to reach a SNR=3 for various source intensities

10 Thinned LLLCCD with Gain=1000

Thinned LLLCCD +Photon Counting

Source intensity at the detector
(photons per pixel per second)

Conventional CCD
1

0.1

0.01
0 200 400 600 800 1000
Exposure Time Seconds

QE=70%
Amplifier Noise =5e
Background =0.001 photons per pixel per second
Possible Application 4.
Wave Front Sensors

Algorithm used on the current NAOMI WFS produces reliable centroid

data when total signal per sub-aperture exceeds about 60 photons.

10 Current NAOMI WFS

9 Thinned LLLCCD With Gain=1000
8
shot noise limit
7

6
SNR

0
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Photons per pixel per WFS frame

Amplifier Noise=5e
QE= 70%
 Marconi LLLCCD Products 1.

CCD65
Aimed at TV applications
as a substitute for image Camera systems based on this
tube sensors. 576 x 288 pixels. chip available winter 2001
Thick frontside illuminated,
peak QE of 35%.
Would subtend 51” x 39” at WHT CASS
20 x 30um pixels

CCD 60
128x 128 pixel, thinned, has been built Low Priority for Marconi without
but still under encouragement from the astronomical
development. For possible community
application to Wavefront Sensing.

CCD 79,86,87
Proposed future devices up to 1K square,
> 10 frames per second readout at As above
sub-electron noise levels.
Marconi LLLCCD Products 2.
L3CS
Packaged camera containing TE cooled CCD65
frontside illuminated
20ms-100sec integration times
2e per pix per sec dark current
Binning and Windowing available
Firewire Interface +video output
Available towards end of 2001 (£25K)

L3CA
Packaged camera containing TE cooled CCD65
frontside illuminated
20ms-100sec integration times
<1e per pix per sec dark current
Binning available
video output
Lecture slides available on the ING web:

http://www.ing.iac.es/~smt/LLLCCD/lllccd.htm