X-ray Hybrid CMOS Detectors: Recent Development and Characterization Progress

TL;DR

This paper reviews recent advancements in X-ray Hybrid CMOS Detectors, highlighting improved energy resolution, new small-pixel designs, and applications for future space missions, demonstrating their advantages over traditional CCDs.

Contribution

The paper reports on the development and characterization of new HCDs, including a high-resolution detector flown on a rocket, small-pixel arrays, and a Speedster-EXD prototype with enhanced readout capabilities.

Findings

Improved energy resolution of ~2.7% at 5.9 keV.

Successful flight of a HCD on a NASA sounding rocket.

Development of a Speedster-EXD with an order of magnitude faster readout.

Abstract

X-ray Hybrid CMOS Detectors (HCDs) have advantages over X-ray CCDs due to their higher readout rate abilities, flexible readout, inherent radiation hardness, and low power, which make them more suitable for the next generation large area X-ray telescope missions. The Penn State high energy astronomy laboratory has been working on the development and characterization of HCDs in collaboration with Teledyne Imaging Sensors (TIS). We characterized an H2RG detector with a Cryo-SIDECAR readout and controller, and we find an improved energy resolution of ~2.7 % at 5.9 keV and read noise of ~6.5 e-. This detector was successfully flown on NASA's first water recovery sounding rocket flight on April 4th, 2018. We have also been developing several new HCDs with potential applications for future X-ray astronomy missions. We are characterizing the performance of small-pixel HCDs (12.5 {\mu}m pitch), which are important for the development of a next-generation high-resolution imager with HCDs. We also characterized a 64 x 64 pixel prototype Speedster-EXD detector that uses comparators in each pixel to read out only those pixels having detectable signal, thereby providing an order of magnitude improvement in the effective readout rate. HCDs can also be utilized as a large FOV instrument to study the prompt and afterglow emissions of GRBs and detect black hole transients. In this context, we are characterizing a Lobster-HCD system for future CubeSat experiments. This paper briefly presents these new developments and experimental results.