Texas Instruments Corporation

Joseph E Hall

Charles G Roberts

A floating gate amplifier in a charge-coupled device (CCD) permitting non-destructive readout, where the floating gate is conductively coupled through a high resistance element to a bias voltage. The floating gate is defined by a lower level of metallization which is embedded in an insulating layer and crosses the charge transfer channel. In one embodiment the floating gate is connected to the source of a metal-oxide-semiconductor transistor and the drain of the transistor is connected to an upper level conductor which is a bias line. In another embodiment, the anode of a diode is connected to the floating gate and the diode cathode is connected to the bias line. A pair of control gates adjacent to and partially overlapping the floating gate transfer charge packets and improve sensitivity. Reading is accomplished by detecting voltages induced on the floating gate by the charge packets.

Floating gate amplifier using conductive coupling for charge coupled

A charge-coupled device (CCD) imager has an output shift register having a number of bits equal to at least a multiple (N), where N is an integer greater than 1, times the number of columns of pixels in the imager. Appropriately spaced in the output shift register are N groups of N outputs each for non-destructive, simultaneous readout of N.times.N bits. The N.times.N bits are then available for pre-processing or display without the requirement for having previously stored each bit, digitally represented, in a computer memory.

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Richardson, TX, United States of America

Joseph E Hall