Gamma and Cosmic Ray Astrophysics

 
 
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CMOS electronics development for nuclear detectors.

Many modern applications in nuclear measurements require imaging detectors.  As the image resolution and quality improve, the number of channels of electronics is also increasing.  This puts competing demands on size, cost, weight and power for the supporting electronics.  Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) are being developed to meet this challenge.  Analog CMOS ASICs are an attractive solution.  These devices are lower power and very much smaller than  conventional discrete and hybrid electronics.  These devices are typically designed to meet the specific needs of a particular detector or application. 

NRL is developing and/or adapting a variety ASICs to meet the electronics requirements of a variety of projects.  These include: 

  1. Readout of a germanium strip detector (ATHENA and Constellation-X/ HXT)
  2. Readout of a silicon strip detector (Constellation-X/ HXT)
  3. Readout of silicon photodiode detectors (GLAST calorimeter)
  4. Readout of PMTs.  Applications are position sensitive photomultipliers (FIREBALL and BLAST) and PMTs (ATIC calorimeter and plastic scintillators)
  5. Readout of silicon pad detectors (ATIC and ACCESS)
128 channel readout chip made by IDEAS, Norway (photo).  The XA-1 chip was designed to read out silicon strip detectors and is one of several chips that are commercially available for this purpose.  Our laboratory has adapted this chip to provide general purpose readout of the detectors we are developing.   The chip is mounted directly to the circuit board minimizing parastic capacitance between the electronics and the detector, thus minimizing system noise. 
Back to Position Sensitive Detectors Project
For questions, please contact Richard Kroeger.
last updated: 27-Oct-1998