A Self-Powered Asynchronous Image Sensor With TFS Operation

This article presents a self-powered image sensor with a novel pixel architecture with energy harvesting capabilities. Pixels are autonomous entities that can harvest or sense illumination independently. Pixels have a fully asynchronous operation and do not require to be scanned to read out their asynchronous output. The sensor was manufactured in UMC 180-nm technology and tested. Their specifications are competitive against the art, offering fast operation, a good balance between the energy consumed and harvested, and high-dynamic range operation. The article describes the sensor and pixel architectures in detail and provides experimental results. Sensor specifications are benchmarked against the art.