DIGITAL SILICON PHOTOMULTIPLIER FOR TOF-PET
First Claim
1. A radiation detector comprising:
- a scintillator; and
an array of detector pixels disposed monolithically on a common silicon substrate and arranged to receive bursts of light produced by the scintillator in response to received radiation, wherein each detector pixel includes;
an array of detector cells, each detector cell including a photodiode biased in a breakdown region and digital circuitry coupled with the photodiode, the digital circuitry being configured to output a first digital value in a quiescent state and a second digital value responsive to detection of a photon by the photodiode;
digital triggering circuitry configured to output a trigger signal indicative of a start of an integration time period responsive to a selected number of one or more of the detector cells transitioning from the first digital value to the second digital value; and
readout digital circuitry that accumulates a count of a number of transitions of detector cells of the array of detector cells from outputting the first digital value to outputting the second digital value over the integration time period.
0 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A radiation detector includes an array of detector pixels each including an array of detector cells. Each detector cell includes a photodiode biased in a breakdown region and digital circuitry coupled with the photodiode and configured to output a first digital value in a quiescent state and a second digital value responsive to photon detection by the photodiode. Digital triggering circuitry is configured to output a trigger signal indicative of a start of an integration time period responsive to a selected number of one or more of the detector cells transitioning from the first digital value to the second digital value. Readout digital circuitry accumulates a count of a number of transitions of detector cells of the array of detector cells from the first digital state to the second digital state over the integration time period.
-
Citations
22 Claims
-
1. A radiation detector comprising:
-
a scintillator; and an array of detector pixels disposed monolithically on a common silicon substrate and arranged to receive bursts of light produced by the scintillator in response to received radiation, wherein each detector pixel includes; an array of detector cells, each detector cell including a photodiode biased in a breakdown region and digital circuitry coupled with the photodiode, the digital circuitry being configured to output a first digital value in a quiescent state and a second digital value responsive to detection of a photon by the photodiode; digital triggering circuitry configured to output a trigger signal indicative of a start of an integration time period responsive to a selected number of one or more of the detector cells transitioning from the first digital value to the second digital value; and readout digital circuitry that accumulates a count of a number of transitions of detector cells of the array of detector cells from outputting the first digital value to outputting the second digital value over the integration time period. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11)
-
-
12. A positron emission tomography (PET) scanner comprising:
-
a plurality of radiation detectors arranged as one or more rings of detectors surrounding an imaging region and comprising scintillators and digital detector pixels arranged to detect scintillation events produced by the scintillators in response to gamma rays striking the scintillators, wherein each digital detector pixel includes; an array of detector cells, each detector cell including a photodiode biased in a breakdown region; and digital triggering and readout circuitry configured to output a digital representation of a count of photons detected by the array of detector cells in response to the scintillation event and a digital representation of a timestamp indicative of when the scintillation event was detected by the digital detector pixel; and pair detection circuitry configured to process detected scintillation events from the plurality of radiation detectors using energy filtering and time filtering to identify pairs of substantially simultaneous 511 keV gamma ray detections. - View Dependent Claims (13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19)
-
-
20. A positron emission tomography (PET) scanner comprising:
-
a plurality of radiation detectors arranged as one or more rings of detectors surrounding an imaging region and comprising scintillators and digital detector pixels arranged to detect scintillation events produced by the scintillators in response to gamma rays striking the scintillators, wherein the digital detector pixels are configured to output digital representations of counts of photons detected by the digital detector pixels in response to scintillation events and digital representations of timestamps indicative of when scintillation events were detected by the digital detector pixels; and pair detection circuitry configured to process detected scintillation events from the plurality of radiation detectors using energy filtering and time filtering to identify pairs of substantially simultaneous 511 keV gamma ray detections. - View Dependent Claims (21, 22)
-
Specification