AGIPD is a hybrid pixel detector developed by DESY, PSI, and the Universities of Bonn and Hamburg. It is targeted for use at the European XFEL, a source with unique properties: a train of up to 2700 pulses is repeated at 10 Hz rate. The pulses inside a train are ≤100fs long and separated by 220 ns, containing up to 1012 photons of 12.4 keV each. The readout ASICs with 64 x 64 pixels each have to cope with these properties: Single photon sensitivity and a dynamic range up to ⪆104 photons/pixel in the same image as well as storage for as many as possible images of a pulse train for delayed readout, prior to the next train. The high impinging photon flux also requires a very radiation hard design of sensor and ASIC, which uses 130 nm CMOS technology and radiation tolerant techniques. The signal path inside a pixel of the ASIC consists of a charge sensitive preamplifier with 3 individual gains, adaptively selected by a subsequent discriminator. The preamp also feeds to a correlated double sampling stage, which writes to an analogue memory to record 352 frames. It is random-access, so it can be used most efficiently by overwriting bad or empty images. Encoded gain information is stored to a similar memory. Readout of these memories is via a common charge sensitive amplifier in each pixel, and multiplexers on four differential ports. Operation of the ASIC is controlled via a command interface, using 3 LVDS lines. It also serves to configure the chip’s operational parameters and timings.

PERCIVAL (“Pixelated Energy Resolving CMOS Imager, Versatile And Large”) is a monolithic active pixel sensor (MAPS) based on CMOS technology. Is being developed by DESY, RAL/STFC, Elettra, DLS, and PAL to address the various requirements of detectors at synchrotron radiation sources and Free Electron Lasers (FELs) in the soft X-ray regime. These requirements include high frame rates and FELs base-rate compatibility, large dynamic range, single-photon counting capability with low probability of false positives, high quantum efficiency (QE), and (multi-)megapixel arrangements with good spatial resolution. Small-scale back-side-illuminated (BSI) prototype systems are undergoing detailed testing with X-rays and optical photons, in preparation of submission of a larger sensor. A first BSI processed prototype was tested in 2014 and a preliminary result—first detection of 350eV photons with some pixel types of PERCIVAL—reported at this meeting a year ago. Subsequent more detailed analysis revealed a very low QE and pointed to contamination as a possible cause. In the past year, BSI-processed chips on two more wafers were tested and their response to soft X-ray evaluated. We report here the improved charge collection efficiency (CCE) of different PERCIVAL pixel types for 400eV soft X-rays together with Airy patterns, response to a flat field, and noise performance for such a newly BSI-processed prototype sensor.

The PERCIVAL (Pixelated Energy Resolving CMOS Imager, Versatile And Large) soft X-ray 2D imaging detector is based on stitched, wafer-scale sensors possessing a thick epi-layer, which together with back-thinning and back-side illumination yields elevated quantum efficiency in the photon energy range of 125-1000 eV. Main application fields of PERCIVAL are foreseen in photon science with FELs and synchrotron radiation. This requires high dynamic range up to 105 ph @ 250 eV paired with single photon sensitivity with high confidence at moderate frame rates in the range of 10-120 Hz. These figures imply the availability of dynamic gain switching on a pixel-by-pixel basis and a highly parallel, low noise analog and digital readout, which has been realized in the PERCIVAL sensor layout.Different aspects of the detector performance have been assessed using prototype sensors with different pixel and ADC types. This work will report on the recent test results performed on the newest chip prototypes with the improved pixel and ADC architecture. For the target frame rates in the 10-120 Hz range an average noise floor of 14 e(-) has been determined, indicating the ability of detecting single photons with energies above 250 eV. Owing to the successfully implemented adaptive 3-stage multiple-gain switching, the integrated charge level exceeds 4 . 10(6) e-or 57000 X-ray photons at 250eV per frame at 120 Hz. For all gains the noise level remains below the Poisson limit also in high-flux conditions. Additionally, a short overview over the updates on an oncoming 2 Mpixel (P2M) detector system (expected at the end of 2016) will be reported.

The PERCIVAL soft X-ray imager is being developed by DESY, RAL, Elettra, DLS, and PAL to address the challenges at high brilliance Light Sources such as new-generation Synchrotrons and Free Electron Lasers. Typical requirements for detector systems at these sources are high frame rates, large dynamic range, single-photon counting capability with low probability of false positives, high quantum efficiency, and (multi)-mega-pixel arrangements. PERCIVAL is a monolithic active pixel sensor, based on CMOS technology. It is designed for the soft X-ray regime and, therefore, it is post-processed in order to achieve high quantum efficiency in its primary energy range (250 eV to 1 keV). This work will report on the latest experimental results on charge collection efficiency obtained for multiple back-side-illuminated test sensors during two campaigns, at the P04 beam-line at PETRA III, and the CiPo beam-line at Elettra, spanning most of the primary energy range as well as testing the performance for photon-energies below 250 eV. In addition, XPS surface analysis was used to cross-check the obtained results.

AGIPD (adaptive gain integrating pixel detector) is a detector system developed for the European XFEL (XFEL.EU), which is currently being constructed in Hamburg, Germany. The XFEL.EU will operate with bunch trains at a repetition rate of 10 Hz. Each train consists of 2700 bunches with a temporal separation of 220 ns corresponding to a rate of 4.5 MHz. Each photon pulse has a duration of < 100 fs (rms) and contains up to 1012 photons in an energy range between 0.25 and 25 keV . In order to cope with the large dynamic range, the first stage of each bump-bonded AGIPD ASIC is a charge sensitive preamplifier with three different gain settings that are dynamically switched during the charge integration. Dynamic gain switching allows single photon resolution in the high gain stage and can cover a dynamic range of 104 × 12.4 keV photons in the low gain stage. The burst structure of the bunch trains forces to have an intermediate in-pixel storage of the signals. The full scale chip has 352 in-pixel storage cells inside the pixel area of 200 × 200 μm2. This contribution will report on the measurements done with the new calibration circuitry of the AGIPD1.1 chip (without sensor). These results will be compared with the old version of the chip (AGIPD1.0). A new calibration method (that is not AGIPD specific) will also be shown.

The Adaptive Gain Integrating Pixel Detector (AGIPD) is a hybrid pixel X-ray detector for the European-XFEL. One of the detector's important parts is the radiation tolerant front end ASIC fulfilling the European-XFEL requirements: high dynamic range—from sensitivity to single 12.5keV-photons up to 104 photons. It is implemented using the dynamic gain switching technique with three possible gains of the charge sensitive preamplifier. Each pixel can store up to 352 images in memory operated in random-access mode at ⩾4.5 MHz frame rate. An external vetoing may be applied to overwrite unwanted frames.

The AGIPD (adaptive gain integrating pixel detector) detector is a high frame rate (4.5MHz) and high dynamic range (up to 104 ·12.4keV photons) detector with single photon resolution (down to 4keV taking 5σ as limit and lowest noise settings) developed for the European XFEL (XFEL.EU). This work is focused on the characterization of AGIPD1.0, which is the first full scale version of the chip. The chip is 64×64 pixels and each pixel has a size of 200×200μm2. Each pixel can store up to 352 images at a rate of 4.5MHz (corresponding to 220ns). A detailed characterization of the AGIPD1.0 chip has been performed in order to assess the main performance of the ASIC in terms of gain, noise, speed and dynamic range. From the measurements presented in this paper a good uniformity of the gain, a noise around 320 e− (rms) in standard mode and around 240 e− (rms) in high gain mode has been measured. Furthermore a detailed discussion about the non-linear behavior after the gain switching is presented with both experimental results and simulations.

Considerable interest has been manifested for the use of high-brilliance X-ray synchrotron sources and X-ray Free-Electron Lasers for the investigation of samples.

The PERCIVAL ("Pixelated Energy Resolving CMOS Imager, Versatile and Large") is a collaboration of DESY, RAL/STFC, ELETTRA, and DLS to develop a monolithic active pixel sensor (MAPS) to provide a suitable detector for photon science for the photon energy regime between 250 eV and 1 keV. An important performance parameter is the spatial resolution which can be inferred from the Modulation Transfer Function (MTF). The MTF measures in optical systems the relative contrast of a pattern in function of the spatial frequency. With a back-thinned and back- illuminated PERCIVAL prototype chip, dedicated MTF evaluation data were taken at Elettra's TwinMic Beamline in March 2014 at a photon energy of 535 eV. We will present our MTF derivation approaches together with MTF results for 3 pixel types of the irradiated test sensor.

The European XFEL is an extremely brilliant Free Electron Laser Source with a very demanding pulse structure: trains of 2700 X-Ray pulses are repeated at 10 Hz. The pulses inside the train are spaced by 220 ns and each one contains up to 10 12 photons of 12.4 keV, while being ≤ 100 fs in length. AGIPD (Adaptive Gain Integrating Pixel Detector) is a hybrid 1M-pixel detector developed by DESY, PSI, and the Universities of Bonn and Hamburg to cope with these properties. Thus the readout ASIC has to provide not only single photon sensitivity and a dynamic range ≳ 10 4 photons/pixel in the same image but also a memory for as many images of a pulse train as possible for delayed readout prior to the next train. The AGIPD 1.0 ASIC uses a 130 nm CMOS technology and radiation tolerant techniques to withstand the radiation damage incurred by the high impinging photon flux. Each ASIC contains 64 × 64 pixels of 200μmχ200μm. The circuit of each pixel contains a charge sensitive preamplifier with threefold switchable gain, a discriminator for an adaptive gain selection, and a correlated double sampling (CDS) stage to remove reset and low-frequency noise components. The output of the CDS, as well as the dynamically selected gain is sampled in a capacitor-based analogue memory for 352 samples, which occupies about 80% of a pixels area. For readout each pixel features a charge sensitive buffer. A control circuit with a command based interface provides random access to the memory and controls the row-wise readout of the data via multiplexers to four differential analogue ports. The AGIPD 1.0 full scale ASIC has been received back from the foundry in fall of 2013. Since then it has been extensively characterised also with a sensor as a single chip and in 2 × 8-chip modules for the AGIPD 1 Mpix detector. We present the design of the AGIPD 1.0 ASIC along with supporting results, also from beam tests at PETRA III and APS, and show changes incorporated in the recently taped out AGIPD 1.1 ASIC upgrade.

The PERCIVAL soft-X-ray (250 eV 1 keV) image detector project is a collaboration between DESY, STFC, Elettra Sincrotrone Trieste and Diamond Light Source. The objective of the project is to develop a back-thinned CMOS detector which outperforms present soft-X ray image detector technology, in terms of sensor size, noise, dynamic range and frame rate. The size of this 13M pixel imager associated with its 120 frames per second frame rate impose very challenging requirements to the Data Acquisition Backend of the system. A DAQ backend system architecture, using a commercial deep-buffer switch to rearrange image data streams coming from different regions of the sensor via several 10Gbps Ethernet links has been proposed to reassemble image frames. Real-time data processing is to be performed on multiple, parallel commodity compute nodes. This contribution to the conference reports on benchmarking tests performed as a feasibility study, and presents the resulting recommendations for the system architecture of the PERCIVAL detector DAQ backend. The feasibility study covered three key issues: Reliably moving data in UDP packets from multiple 10Gbps Ethernet links from the DAQ front-end electronics to commodity compute nodes; Real-time processing on the compute nodes; and finally streaming data to a central parallel storage system.

AGIPD is a charge integrating, hybrid pixel readout ASIC, which is under development for the European XFEL [1, 2]. A dynamic gain switching logic at the output of the preamplifier (preamp) is used to provide single photon resolution as well as covering a dynamic range of at least 10(4).12.4 keV photons [3, 4]. Moreover, at each point of the dynamic range the electronics noise should be lower than the Poisson fluctuations, which is especially challenging at the points of gain switching.This paper reports on the progress of the chip design on the way to the first full-scale chip AGIPD1.0, focusing on the optimization of the dynamic range and the implementation of protection circuits at the preamplifier input to avoid pixel destruction due to high intense spots.

With the continual drive towards bigger, better, and brighter light sources, whole new areas of scientific research are possible that would have been unimaginable or even were believed impossible before. For example, imaging of single bioparticles has been demonstrated at Free Electron Lasers (FELs) [1 M. Seibert, Nature 470, 78–81 (2011).[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]], and synchrotron beamlines can now be used to study real-time changes in samples on a timescale of milliseconds.

High-frame-rate X-ray pixel detectors make it possible to perform time-resolved experiments at synchrotron beamlines, and to make better use of these sources by shortening experiment times. LAMBDA is a photon-counting hybrid pixel detector based on the Medipix3 chip, designed to combine a small pixel size of 55 μm, a large tileable module design, high speed, and compatibility with ``high-Z'' sensors for hard X-ray detection. This technical paper focuses on LAMBDA's high-speed-readout functionality, which allows a frame rate of 2000 frames per second with no deadtime between successive images. This takes advantage of the Medipix3 chip's ``continuous read-write'' function and highly parallelised readout. The readout electronics serialise this data and send it back to a server PC over two 10 Gigabit Ethernet links. The server PC controls the detector and receives, processes and stores the data using software designed for the Tango control system. As a demonstration of high-speed readout of a high-Z sensor, a GaAs LAMBDA detector was used to make a high-speed X-ray video of a computer fan.

AGIPD is a hybrid pixel X-ray detector developed by a collaboration between Deutsches Elektronen-Synchrotron (DESY), Paul-Scherrer-Institute (PSI), University of Hamburg and the University of Bonn. The detector is designed to comply with the requirements of the European XFEL. The radiation tolerant Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) is designed with the following highlights: high dynamic range, spanning from single photon sensitivity up to 104 × 12.4 keV photons, achieved by the use of dynamic gain switching, auto-selecting one of 3 gains of the charge sensitive pre-amplifier. To cope with the unique features of the European XFEL source, image data is stored in 352 analogue memory cells per pixel. The selected gain is stored in the same way and depth, encoded as one of 3 voltage levels. These memories are operated in random-access mode at 4.5MHz frame rate. Data is read out on a row-by-row basis via multiplexers to the DAQ system for digitisation during the 99.4ms gap between the bunch trains of the European XFEL. The AGIPD 1.0 ASIC features 64×64 pixels with a pixel area of 200×200 µm2. It is bump-bonded to a 500 µm thick silicon sensor. The principles of the chip architecture were proven in different experiments and the ASIC characterization was performed with a series of development prototypes. The mechanical concept of the detector system was developed in close contact with the XFEL beamline scientists to ensure a seamless integration into the beamline setup and is currently being manufactured. The first single module system was successfully tested at APS1 the high dynamic range allows imaging of the direct synchrotron beam along with single photon sensitivity and burst imaging of 352 subsequent frames synchronized to the source.

Replacing planar circuits with vertically integrated ones allows to increment circuit functionalities on a given silicon area, while avoiding some of the problems associated with aggressively scaled technology nodes. This is particularly true for applications likely to subject circuits to high doses of ionizing radiation (such of x-ray detectors to be used in synchrotron rings and Free Electron Lasers), since the degradation mechanisms of some of the innovative materials to be used in most recent nodes have not been fully characterized yet. In this paper, an evolution is presented for the readout ASIC of a pixelated x-ray detector to be used for such applications. The readout circuit is distributed in a stack of two vertically interconnected tiers, thus doubling the circuitry resident in each pixel without increasing the pixel pitch (and thus compromising spatial resolution of the detector). A first prototype has been designed and manufactured, using a commercial 130nm CMOS technology. Design issues are discussed, along with preliminary characterization results.

Free-Electron Lasers and Synchrotrons are rapidly increasing in brilliance. This has led a requirement of large dynamic range and high frame rate sensors that is now being fulfilled by the PERCVIAL CMOS imager for direct X-ray detection developed at Rutherford Appleton Laboratory. Utilising a lateral overflow pixel and back-side illumination, PERCIVAL simultaneously achieves low-noise single-photon detection and high full well up to 10(7) e(-), all while maintaining a frame rate of 120Hz. PERCIVAL is currently in test structure stage, and will be produced in 2 Mpixel and 13 Mpixel "waferscale" variants in 2015.

Over the last decade, synchrotron radiation sources have seen a significant increase in brilliance, and the advent of free electron lasers has made entire new research fields accessible to investigations with X-rays. These advances in light source capabilities have resulted not only in a host of scientific advances and discoveries, but also in a need for a new generation of X-ray imaging detectors that can match the sources' capabilities in terms of frame rate and image dynamic range while recording image information with fine granularity over a large – preferably uninterrupted – (multi)megapixel area with single-photon sensitivity. Developing such next-generation imagers is both costly and time-consuming, and the requirements at many photon science facilities are similar enough to invite a collaborative effort. The Percival (“Pixellated Energy Resolving CMOS Imager, Versatile And Large”) imager is being developed by a collaboration of DESY, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL), Elettra, and Diamond Light Source (DLS) to answer this need for the soft X-ray regime.