Characterizing subpixel spatial resolution of a hybrid CMOS detector
Abstract
Soft x-rays (0.1 to 10 keV) will liberate between tens and thousands of electrons from the absorber array of a depleted silicon detector. These electrons tend to diffuse outward into what is referred to as the charge cloud, which is then picked up by several pixels and forms a specific pattern based on the exact incident location of the x-ray. By performing the first ever application of a "mesh experiment" on a hybrid CMOS detector (HCD), we have experimentally determined the charge cloud shape and used it to perform subpixel localization of incident x-rays on a photon-by-photon basis for a custom 36-μm pixel pitch H2RG HCD. We find that significant spatial resolution improvement is possible for all events, with 68% confidence regions equal to 7.1 × 7.1, 0.4 × 7.1, and 0.4 × 0.4 μm for 1-pixel, 2-pixel, and 3- to 4-pixel events, respectively. This represents a much finer resolution than that provided by containment within a single pixel.
- Publication:
-
Journal of Astronomical Telescopes, Instruments, and Systems
- Pub Date:
- July 2018
- DOI:
- 10.1117/1.JATIS.4.3.038002
- Bibcode:
- 2018JATIS...4c8002B