A high frame rate image sensor in standard CMOS-technology

An integrated CMOS image sensor suitable for monitoring fast motion e.g. in very fast industrial processes, crash tests, and high speed machine vision has been developed and tested. The test chip contains 128x128 active sensor cells and it is equipped with an electronic shutter, advanced column current-mode readout circuits and column voltage buffers. For design and fabrication a standard 1.0 mu m n-well CMOS process has been used. The size of a single pixel cell is 27.6 mu m x 27.6mu m with a fill factor of 42 per cent incorporating four NMOS transistors. The total chip area is 30 mm2. The sensor cells show a linear response to illumination. The test chip is capable to acquire 1030 frames/s.