Low-noise readout channel with a novel dynamic signal compression for future X-FEL applications

This work presents the design of a read-out channel suitable for application to silicon pixel detectors for the next generation Free Electron Laser (FEL) experiments. The readout architecture, which has been carried out in a 65 nm CMOS technology, consists of a low-noise charge sensitive amplifier (CSA) with dynamic signal compression, a time-variant shaping stage and a low-power analog-to-digital converter (ADC), hosted in a 100 µm-pitch pixel. The blocks will be operated in such a way to cope with the high frame rates (exceeding 1 MHz) foreseen for future X-ray FEL machines. The paper describes in detail the architecture and the performance of the CSA and provides an overview about the analog readout channel.